Key points 

  • High carbon stocks in wetlands, bogs, swamps are not depleted over the long term. 

  • The harvesting of hardwoods does not adversely affect the ability of the forest to sequester and store carbon. 

Key facts 

  • Research is available that demonstrates that forest management in the U.S. does not diminish the capability of the forest to serve as carbon sinks. Forests are shown to serve as a carbon sink and offset 13 percent of carbon emissions from the burning of fossil fuel: http://www.fs.usda.gov/ccrc/topics/forest-carbon  

  • Research addressing harvest impacts on soil carbon storage in temperate forests indicates that there are no significant impacts on mineral soils and their capacity to serve as carbon sinks: http://www.nrs.fs.fed.us/pubs/jrnl/2010/nrs_2010_nave_001.pdf  

  • U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has found that carbon storage in U.S. forests continues to increase, sequestering more than 900 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalents annually and offsetting. 

Details 

Seneca Creek 2017 Assessment: Section 4: Based on the most current data available from four independent federal agencies tasked with monitoring of the nation’s natural resources, we can conclude that bottomland hardwood forests have been stable or increasing in areal extent in the past decade. 

Seneca Creek 2017 Assessment: Finding 3: The United States has, through the U.S. Forest Service Forest Inventory & Analysis (FIA) Program, one of the most comprehensive and continuous inventories of forest resources in the world. The FIA enables annual monitoring and early detection of forest sustainability issues. Growth-to-removals ratios by state range from 1.3 to 12.9, strongly evidencing that there is virtually no risk from a national or state perspective that U.S. hardwoods are being harvested at a rate that is problematic from a sustained yield perspective. [Section 3] 

Seneca Creek 2017 Assessment: Finding: Bottomland hardwoods in wetland areas often have high concentrations of biodiversity and are environmentally sensitive in terms of maintaining water quality and other ecosystem services. Based upon an analysis of four data sets, the Study Team concludes that the extent of these areas has not changed appreciably over the past decade. [Section 4]