By Bryce Oates for The Daily Yonder. Broadcast version by Chance Dorland for North Carolina News Service, reporting for The Daily Yonder-Public News Service Collaboration.

In Western North Carolina's Nantahala-Pisgah National Forest, a committed group of outdoor recreation enthusiasts, conservationists, hunting and fishing groups, forest product businesses and forest ecology advocates has been working closely with the U.S. Forest Service for years to update the agency's regional forest management plan.

But the Nantahala Pisgah Forest Partnership now is formally objecting to the plan the agency issued earlier this year, saying that the plan will lead to "more conflict and less collaboration" in several categories.

"One of our main objections is that the plan doesn't abide by the collaborative goals we set for progress toward ecological, social and economic sustainability," said Hugh Irwin, a Partnership participant and Landscape Conservation Planner for The Wilderness Society, in an interview with the Daily Yonder. "This group has been working together for years to avoid potential conflicts between harvest, old-growth, recreational goals, the needs of wildlife and carbon storage in forests."

The USFS plan expands timber harvest into more than 100,000 acres of known old-growth, state-recognized Natural Heritage Natural Areas, and largely undeveloped, inaccessible wilderness tracts, Irwin and other conservationists stated in official comments on the plan as part of a formal objection.

The Partnership's alternative, which included consensus agreement from timber harvesters and loggers, would have protected those same areas from logging and development.

In many cases, these forest collaboratives like the Nantahala-Pisgah Forest Partnership have successfully prevented potential conflicts in rural communities between the timber industry, environmental advocates, public land employees and a growing rural outdoor-recreation economy.

Irwin said that input into the planning process generated more than 14,000 public comments, among the largest response rates ever for a forest management issue in the eastern United States. "The Nantahala-Pisgah is at the heart of the Southern Appalachians in a lot of ways. It's the center of the Southern Blue Ridge area of the region. It represents some of the most consolidated areas of National Forest and ownership in the East, and is also adjacent to Great Smoky Mountains National Park, another center of public lands and biodiversity," Irwin said, explaining why so many citizens commented on the plan.

Among the most critical objections to the agency's plan is the role of old-growth forests in storing carbon as a means of climate-change mitigation. "There is an explicit link between old-growth and carbon storage, between old-growth and adapting to climate change. One of the major ways we have carbon stored on the landscape is through our forests. When you do scientific carbon modeling, it's obvious that there are many, many times more carbon stored in mature and old-growth forests than there are in young forest," Irwin said.

Old-growth forest protection and management issues on federal lands are likely to see increasing attention in the coming months. On Earth Day, President Joe Biden issued an Executive Order on Strengthening the Nation's Forests, Communities, and Local Economies, committing to conserve and restore forests, including old-growth forests, their assessment and cataloging, and the analysis of mature and old-growth forest contributions to climate change protections.

Old-growth forest advocates largely cheered the White House order and attention to the issue.

"Just to hear the words 'old-growth forests' come out of the mouth of the President of the United States is a big thrill for us," said Dr. Joan Maloof, executive director and fdounder of the Old Growth Forest Network, in an email to Daily Yonder.

"Biden's Bipartisan Infrastructure Law is an important step in what we hope will be an eventual moratorium on any logging of old-growth forests from our federal forests. With their large trees, complex biodiversity and rich soils, these are the most crucial forests for carbon storage and they should be left untouched by the impacts of logging."

OGFN, along with 135 climate and natural resource experts, recently sent a letter making the case for federal old-growth forest protections. "There are so many reasons to protect our nation's oldest forests, from climate to biodiversity to beauty, we have been saying this for years, and we are thrilled to be making political progress toward this. It is a great Earth Day to celebrate, indeed," Maloof said.

Some climate-action advocates were not pleased with Biden's Earth Day actions.

"The Administration had a real opportunity to show leadership on Earth Day this year and failed miserably," said Jim Walsh, policy director of Food and Water Watch. "We will never offset our fossil-fuel usage by planting more trees. What we need to do is actually get to the root of the problem, and the major sources of emissions are coming from our energy and transportation systems. We've got to stop burning fossil fuels."

Walsh added that additional reductions in climate emissions can be had in the agricultural sector. "Factory farming is continuing to grow and thrive, producing significant amounts of greenhouse gases through giant livestock operations and massive fertilizer usage. We simply cannot phase out fossil fuels or cut agricultural pollution while the administration continues to pump billions of dollars in subsidies [to fossil fuels and industrial agriculture]. . . while ignoring the real work that needs to be done to address the climate crisis," Walsh said.

Back in North Carolina, Irwin hopes that the renewed attention to old-growth forest issues at the federal level can help to both address climate change and support needed management improvements to the local Nantahala-Pisgah forest region.

"I'm really excited about the president's order," Irwin said. "This is the most obvious climate mitigation we should be doing in our public forests - saving the existing old-growth, but also preserving the existing forests that are in great shape that could become old growth in the future."

As Minnesotans click the "purchase" button when shopping online for the holidays, they're urged to consider two things: toys from overseas suppliers that don't meet safety standards and how e-commerce affects the environment. In its annual toy safety report, the U.S. Public Interest Research Group says loopholes in shipping enforcement allow too many unsafe and illegal products, including those designed for kids, to flood the market.

Teresa Murray, PIRG's consumer watchdog director, said items shipped in bulk that fall below a certain value threshold often avoid scrutiny from U.S. customs officials, and that means for now, shoppers have to be extra vigilant.

"We've also gotten used to how easy it is to shop online, but when people are shopping online, they just need to be super, super careful. Take a few minutes and figure out where that toy is coming from," she said.

Murray added that there are concerns about some toys containing lead or other toxins or having small parts that easily break off, and added that the good news is, there's a bipartisan tone in Washington, D.C., to address the issue. Meanwhile, sustainability experts warn the massive growth in e-commerce leads to more distribution centers in rural areas, increasing trucking distances and exacerbating carbon emissions.

Another concerning trend in the report is the persistent illegal online sales of recalled toys. Murray said brick-and-mortar retailers are more committed to keeping those items out of circulation. Beyond protecting your family and the environment, she suggests replacing digital purchases with in-person shopping might help the economy, because you're fighting back against counterfeit products.

"Frankly, it hurts U.S. companies and U.S. workers when you have these brands that have built a reputation and somebody - you know, it could be domestic, it could be international - and they're making a product that looks just like yours," she explained.

As for e-commerce waste, Minnesota recently adopted a law that incentivizes producers to scale down their use of packaging that often ends up in landfills. A handful of other states have taken similar steps. And online shopping giants like Amazon have highlighted efforts to phase out packaging elements deemed unfriendly to the environment.


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A nonprofit group that tracks oil and gas development has created an interactive map to show how close CO2 pipelines in Great Plains states come to environmentally and ecologically sensitive areas.

The map includes Indigenous land that hasn't been included in similar previous projects.

Ted Auch, Midwest program director for the FracTracker Alliance, said it focuses on Indigenous areas but goes further, showing in detail how close proposed CO2 pipelines would come to soybean and ethanol facilities, for example, but also to private land.

He said the interactive map is an improvement over existing ones.

"Which is to say that you could look at it as a static image, but you can't interact with or manipulate the data in terms of, like, scrolling in, scrolling out, finding addresses - you know, that kind of thing," said Auch. "It's available as a PDF or a JPG. So, what we've done is, we've taken that stuff and we've digitized it and we've included it on this map, so that people can actually - spatially and in real time - interact with the data itself."

The Great Plains Action Society says CO2 pipelines pose risks that disproportionately affect Indigenous communities and people of color.

Auch said FracTracker is working on another version that takes a deeper look at the proximity of pipelines to the Winnebago reservation south of Sioux City.

Energy companies say the pipelines are a safe and effective way to capture carbon from industrial processes, and store it underground, reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Auch said the interactive map will give farmers and other landowners near the proposed pipelines what they need to understand what's happening on their land, leveling the information playing field with corporate interests.

"You have these large, multinational corporations, and then on the other side of the ledger are small, medium-sized frontline or Indigenous groups that either have small budgets or no budgets," said Auch, "and don't have the capacity, the time, or the expertise to develop maps to inform their organizing activism or advocacy."

The Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals in Omaha is making a livestream available as it hears oral arguments today in a case involving Iowa landowners affected by CO2 pipeline proposals, some of whom face seizure of their property by eminent domain if the Summit Carbon Solutions project moves forward.




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The Environmental Protection Agency is delivering more than $21.9 million to the Detroit/Wayne County Port Authority, aiming to provide a greener future and cut pollution from port equipment.

Detroit's Port Authority runs several terminals moving goods and passengers. Steel is the most valuable cargo, while ore is the heaviest. The port also handles things such as stone, coal and cement. The grant will help cover the cost of equipment, such as battery-electric forklifts, cranes, rail car movers, charging stations and solar panels.

Mark Schrupp, executive director of the Detroit Wayne County Port Authority, is especially excited about adding six battery-operated forklift trucks.

"Instead of having diesel fumes going into the air, you're going to have nothing going into the air," Schrupp pointed out. "That'll be the biggest impact is on air quality, or the workers and the people around those terminals."

Schrupp noted the funding will help them reach their goal of achieving net-zero carbon emissions by 2040, while also improving air quality in the Southwest Detroit area, which has been deemed to have the worst air quality in Michigan.

He highlighted Port Detroit will also get a $3 million grant to plan a switch to hydrogen and green methanol, train workers and explore a zero-emission fuel cell barge for docked ships. The funding comes from the Inflation Reduction Act and the EPA's Clean Ports program.

"Electric equipment is good, but in the long run, the heavier duty equipment will probably run better with hydrogen-powered fuel cell equipment," Schrupp explained. "A lot of that equipment is still in research phase, so we're not in a position to transition right now."

Schrupp noted Southwest Detroit Environmental Vision will lead community engagement and worker training, while Michigan Clean Cities and NextEnergy will support zero-emission equipment.


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