Calaveras Enterprise -- Clear cuts fuel global warming, critics say

Taking environmental protest against timber clear-cutting to a new level, ForestEthics, a San Francisco-based conservation group, released a report last week showing how Sierra Pacific Industries has contributed to global warming. The report, highlighted in a press conference on Thursday conducted by Ebbets Pass Forest Watch, predicts a dire future for the Sierra's forests, wildlife and water if the logging company continues with its plans to clear-cut and farm trees on plantations cut from the forest.

Sierra Pacific Industries, or SPI, is the state's largest logging company, and the company disputes the report's conclusions. SPI recently issued its own study contradicting the ForestEthics' findings.

Ebbets Pass Forest Watch and Central Sierra Environmental Resource Center have separate lawsuits against SPI and the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire), SPI's state regulator, that have been working their way through the state court system. A California Supreme Court decision is expected shortly, but the court decisions will pertain only to SPI's forestry practices on its lands in Amador County. However, the timber clear-cutting issues the lawsuits challenge are the same as those in Calaveras County.

The report, “Climate of Destruction: The Impact of SPI on Global Warming,” and the press conference focused on the impacts of SPI's past decade of clear-cutting Sierra forests and the company's stated intentions to continue on the path of methodically converting forests to plantation farms in order to harvest bigger trees.