Forest protection, once the “forgotten” climate solution, has become an integral pillar of the climate debate. But while attention has largely focused on forests such as those in the Amazon and Indonesia, climate is not just about what happens in the tropics. It also depends on the boreal; the temperate rainforests of the Pacific. the coniferous forests of the Rocky Mountains. the northeastern coastal forests; the southern wetland forests. These forests in North America are being lost or stripped of mature carbon-rich trees right under our noses and must remain standing and intact if we are to achieve a climate-safe, sustainable future. As the Biden administration tries to act on it historical commitment To reduce US greenhouse gas emissions by at least 50% by 2030, it must adopt a bold new vision for forest protection that looks at how we can protect the climate-critical forest resources in our own backyard.
North America's forests, homelands of indigenous communities and havens of rich biodiversity, are some of the most carbon-dense areas on Earth. These forests are part of the global forest respiratory system that absorbs a third of human-caused greenhouse gas emissions each year. They are also custodians of vast reserves of carbon, safely locked away from the atmosphere in their soils and biomass. Canada's boreal forest alone stores twice as much carbon as the world's oil reserves, while US forests collectively absorb the equivalent of about 12% of the country's annual carbon pollution. Their sentinel stands between us and climate disaster.
Mature, old-growth and intact forests and trees have unparalleled, irreplaceable value for climate and biodiversity, with intact forests storing 30-70% more carbon than logged forests. Once these older and intact forests are logged, the carbon debt can last for centuries. Tree planting and carbon sequestration technologies are climate solutions that will only provide most of their benefits decades from now, long after we must have won the battle against climate change. In the limited time we have left, we cannot continue to overlook the destruction of North America's carbon-rich forests and trees that provide direct climate benefits at a time when we need them most.
The boreal and temperate forests of the US and Canada, like other boreal forests around the world, are facing a quiet extinction. In Canada, which ranks third in the world in annual loss of intact carbon-rich forests, the logging industry clears over a million acres of boreal forests each year, leading to a carbon catastrophe that the country neither accounts for nor adequately regulates. In the US, there is a similar gap in protection for older, carbon-rich forests, which are logged for everything from timber and paper to biomass exported and burned. Thanks in large part to the Trump administration, large tracts of the Tonga National Forest in Alaska, containing 44% of carbon stored in all United States national forests are open to industrial logging.
In the face of this continued loss of forests on both sides of the border, President Biden must make addressing the continued loss of North America's carbon-rich, mature forests and trees a key part of his climate strategy by creating strong protections for them in the U.S. . and working with Canada, which has strong commitments to natural climate solutions but will not meet them without major changes to its logging practices. Together these two countries need a new public forestry framework that looks beyond tree planting and keeps oil and carbon rich forests and trees on the ground.
This protection of these forests is also critical to US and Canadian commitments to protect 30% of land, water and oceans by 2030 (30×30). This was one of President Biden's first initiatives in office, aligning the US with Canada and other countries around the world. But to ensure the climate and biodiversity benefits we need, the implementation of this 30×30 vision must actually protect areas facing industrial threats, not symbolic fallow, and focus on equity and justice, prioritizing leadership of Indigenous Peoples in land conservation. Studies around the world have shown that indigenous management leads to optimal outcomes for climate and biodiversity. In Canada, Indigenous Protected and Conserved Areas (IPCA) and Guardianship programs have already demonstrated the enormous social, economic and environmental potential of indigenous-led initiatives. Now, the US and Canada can work together to develop these opportunities.
One of the biggest policy obstacles to these protections has been how Canada and the US currently calculate carbon loss in forests. The atmosphere does not recognize creative carbon accounting, but unfortunately, with inadequate monitoring and strategic accounting decisions, countries like Canada have downplayed the climate impacts of industrial logging and helped perpetuate misleading narratives about the potential of logging as a climate solution. Particularly given Canada's low climate targets, the US should work with Canada to agree on a rigorous, accurate forest carbon accounting framework to avoid uncounted emissions and put in place a reporting system that captures these impacts and incentivizes climate-friendly logging practices.
The United States, as the largest driver of boreal forest loss worldwide, must also address the impact of its market. 80% of Canada's northern exports end up in the United States as products such as toilet paper, paper towels, lumber and newsprint. Policymakers in California and New York, recognizing the imperative to limit their role in boreal forest loss and related violations of indigenous rights, have introduced bills that would require state contractors to adopt policies to prevent of the degradation of intact boreal forests and the guarantee of the right of indigenous peoples to free, prior and informed consent. Leading investors also began demanding market action to address the loss of climate-critical boreal forests and ensure indigenous self-determination. As the Biden administration overhauls federal procurement policies through initiatives like the Buy Clean program, it must address unsustainable logging operations in the government's own supply chains.
The international community currently has a leadership void in charting a path toward forest protection—a path that the US, along with Canada, can help fill. But the U.S. cannot achieve real global credibility to meet this imperative without acknowledging and addressing the carbon crisis left in the wake of our own bulldozers and logging trucks. By working with Canadian and Indigenous leaders to change the fate of the North American forests we are charged with managing, President Biden can have a meaningful impact both at home and abroad, setting the stage for global protection of greater our allies in the natural climate.
