Ancient cedar stump on Prince of Wales. Photo: Elsa Sebastian.
Alaska Rainforest Defenders filed an objection to the POWLLA project in December 2018. You can download the Alaska Rainforest Defenders objection here, and you can also download an objection filed jointly with Earthjustice and other conservation groups.
The Defender’s are deeply concerned with the USFS’s proposed actions presented in POWLLA, which would:
Log 235 million board feet (MMBF) of old growth timber over the next decade: 25 MMBF annually during the first five years of implementation and 15 MMBF annually during the second five years of implementation.
After logging 235 MMBF Forest Service would then evaluate whether to cut the remaining old growth on the island.
Alternative 2 would also remove 3 MMBF of recovering, second-growth forest annually for the first seven years of the project and then escalate to 50 MMBF per year for the final eight years, for a staggering total of 421 MMBF.6
The agency would construct 129 miles of temporary road and 35 miles of permanent system road, adding to the economic and ecological cost of the project.
These levels of timber extraction are unreasonable, particularly in light of the damaged ecological condition of Prince of Wales. In ARD’s objection we provide more details on impacts on salmon habitat, address the impacts of clearcutting recovering second growth forests, introduced some new science on Prince of Wales wolves, and challenge the idea of the need for timber harvest on Prince of Wales.
To read more, download Alaska Rainforest Defender’s objection.