Our Daily Wood our wood

Every day, each of Earth's 5.4 billion inhabitants, on the average, use the equivalent of a 4-pound slab of wood. But the average American uses 3.5 times this much wood. Should American's be using less wood? No Way!


What's New at evergreenmagazine.com ?

The Lookout - August 14, 2010 - Published by the National Association of Forest Service Retirees. Click here

Activist Environmental Lawyers Bilking Millions from Taxpayers - by Richard Pollock, Washington D.C. Editor, Pajamas Media, Washington, D.C. Bureau Chief, PJTV.  Click here.

The Science & Public Policy Institute has submitted an original paper by Joseph D'Aleo and Anthony Watts, titled, "Surface Temperature Records: Policy Driven Deception?"  (See intro below.)

Hello Forest Service.  Can We Talk?  (See intro below)

Read 'em and Weep - The Public Wants More Logging - by guest columnist Derek Weidensee (see intro below)

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Quote of the Week:

People who think doing nothing in forests is the best way to provide habitat for old growth dependent wildlife species may be fooling themselves. Forestry provides the only means for predicting and controlling the outcome. Forestry is a tool for imposing equilibrium in an otherwise chaotic natural world. By controlling the limits of natural disturbance, we produce outcomes society wants: timber, wildlife habitat, clean water and beautiful forests. Nature is indifferent to society's needs. Forestry tries to fill needs.
Dr. David Loftis, Project Leader, USFS, Bent Creek Experimental Station Asheville, North Carolina, Evergreen, October 1997

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Climate Fact of the Week:

It is a myth that computer models verify that carbon dioxide increases will cause significant global warming. Such models cannot be made to "verify" anything. Despite activist concerns about CO2 levels, rising levels of some so-called "greenhouse gases" may be contributing to higher oxygen levels and global cooling, not warming. Incidentally, CO2 makes up 0.037% of earth's atmosphere.

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Read 'em and Weep - The Public Wants More Logging:

Derek Weidensee, a land surveyor from Rapid City, South Dakota, and a long-time Evergreen Magazine reader, has written a thoughtful essay citing reasons for the slow but steady course correction once negative public attitudes toward logging. Click here

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Hello Forest Service, Can We Talk?:

The Pasadena Star-News took the U.S. Forest Service to task in an even-handed but blistering August 11 editorial concerning agency silence over last year's Station Fire, the largest forest fire in southern California history. Rumors of a criminal investigation continue to swirl about the deadly fire but the venerable agency is maintain radio silence at a time when, increasingly, Americans wonder what the agency stands for and believes.  Click here.

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Global Warming Debate Heats Up Again:

If you're following the global warming debate, and you don't mind wading through a 110-page report, this one documenting surface temperatures around the world makes for fascinating reading. Joseph D'Aleo, co-founder of televisions Weather Channel, and Anthony Watts, founder of Watts Up With That, lay out a pretty convincing case that most of the data being used by global warming alarmists has been rigged to scare the daylights out of you. Click here

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The Road To Hell:

You've heard it said before: the road to hell is paved with the best of intentions. So it goes with American businesses that are trying to "go green." Click here to read a not too surprising report concerning corporate and consumer skepticism over "green" claims.

Ask anyone in the forest products industry about this road to hell looks like. It's taken years for the Sustainable Forestry Initiative to gain marketplace traction, and there still isn't much evidence suggesting that U.S, consumers are willing to pay more for wood from forests that have been subjected to third party audits verifying sustainable forest practices.

Click here to read a pretty decent comparison of the attributes of SFI and its competitor, the Forest Stewardship Council's certification system. Such are the pitfalls facing forest products companies seeking to burnish their green credentials.

If you still haven't had enough, click here to read SFI's most recent sustainability report.

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A Working Forest Dot Com:

Long-time Evergreen Foundation supporter, Bob Williams, a New Jersey consulting forester (yup, they have trees in New Jersey, lots of them) is the driving force behind a powerful new DVD titled, "A Working Forest." View it at http://aworkingforest.com/ . Rolling Stones keyboardist, Chuck Leavell, a Georgia tree farmer narrates. Pretty nice.

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Mike Covey was regional manager for Plum Creek Timber Company when this picture was taken at the company's new medium density fiberboard plant at Columbia Falls, Montana in 1996. Mr. Covey has since moved on and is now chairman, president and chief executive officer of Potlatch Corporation. Potlatch was the Intermountain West's largest vertically integrated forests products company until it sold its manufacturing facilities and became a real estate investment trust. It owns 1.6 million acres of timberland in Idaho, Arkansas, Minnesota and Wisconsin.
Mike Covey was regional manager for Plum Creek Timber Company when this picture was taken at the company's new medium density fiberboard plant at Columbia Falls, Montana in 1996. Mr. Covey has since moved on and is now chairman, president and chief executive officer of Potlatch Corporation. Potlatch was the Intermountain West's largest vertically integrated forests products company until it sold its manufacturing facilities and became a real estate investment trust. It owns 1.6 million acres of timberland in Idaho, Arkansas, Minnesota and Wisconsin.
"We must always consider the environment and people together, as though they are one, because the
human need to use natural resources is fundamental to our continued presence on earth."
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