Alaska Environmental Concerns Reach a Crescendo
10/22/96
OVERVIEW & SOURCE by EE
Following is a photocopy of a Christian Science Monitor article which details
the growing concern over the environment and forests in Alaska, USA. As the
last major wilderness in the United States, there is not reason that the forests
and biodiversity of Alaska should be foresaken for once over resource extraction
as has happened time after time under the western model of overdevelopment.
g.b.
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RELAYED TEXT STARTS HERE:
Alaska has hit an environmental crescendo
Copyright 1996 by Christian Science Monitor
10/20/96
KETCHIKAN, ALASKA -- Say "Alaska" and most people think ice and snow, polar
bears, and a midnight sun. But the panhandle of this vast state, hanging down to
the southeast alongside British Columbia, comprises the largest temperate
rainforest in the world.
This rich and beautiful archipelago, with its thousands of islands and glacier-
etched fjords, its centuries-old trees and abundant wildlife considered
endangered elsewhere, is at the center of a high-stakes political fight over its
future.
Marking the landscape is evidence of the battle: large patches of clearcuts,
some from hilltop to shoreline, totalling nearly 1 million acres.
On one side are loggers, millworkers, and others laboring in the small southeast
Alaska communities cut off from the rest of the world except by boat or plane.
In their corner is the state's congressional delegation - small in number but
powerful in legislative seniority. Backing them are the corporate investors and
lobbyists eager to harvest the millions of acres of giant hemlock and sitka
spruce.
On the other side are environmentalists and their allies - some in the fishing
and tourism industries, wildlife biologists and other natural scientists, and
traditional native Americans whose ancestors have been here nearly 10,000 years.
"It's much more than timber," says Gilbert Fred, president of the Tlingit and
Hiada Community Council in the native village of Angoon, located on Admiralty
Island. "We're fighting for our people's right to live."
An hour or so away by float plane in Ketchikan, where the dominant industry is a
sawmill and pulp plant, retired forester Dick Coose says much the same thing:
"It's an issue of livelihood around here."
The controversy centers on the Tongass National Forest, which sprawls over most
of the area. At nearly 17 million acres, it's bigger than West Virginia and
three times larger than the next-largest national forest. In a way, it's the
story of the western national forests writ large.
But there are differences - no officially endangered spotted owl-type species to
tie things up in court, and a significant number of government agency employees
here are willing to speak out against national forest policy. And there is a
paradox: Many of the biggest clearcuts that mark the Tongass (named for a clan
of Tlingit Indians) have been done by native Americans, typically thought of as
being more protective of the land than the more recent arrivals here of European
descent.
Why should anybody outside of southeast Alaska care about the Tongass National
Forest? For three reasons.
First, the millions of trees that stand on federal land belong to all Americans.
Many of those trees are being cut for export. And if, as the General Accounting
Office reported, the federal government is losing millions a year on the deal in
administrative and road-building costs, that presumably would be a concern to
all taxpayers.
Second, nobody - whether they call themselves an environmentalist or not - wants
to see repeated the decline of wildlife species that has marked the legislative
"gridlock" and "train wrecks" (choose your image) down in Oregon, Washington,
and northern California.
And third, Americans by the hundreds of thousands - the number has doubled over
the past 10 years - are coming here as tourists to learn about and appreciate
the natural beauty that some now find marred by industrial logging. "It's
impacting our business because people don't want to come up here and see
clearcuts," says Sue Warner, who runs an expedition company based in Juneau, the
state capital.
The Tongass National Forest is a veritable Noah's ark of wildlife - home to
several hundred species of mammals, birds, fish, and shellfish. Black bears,
grizzlies, wolves, wolverines, moose, mountain goats, mink, river otters, bald
eagles, goshawks, and five species of salmon.
A walk through the cathedral-like forests at Port Houghton or Red Bluff presents
a seemingly endless variety of trees, shrubs, berries, grasses, and mosses.
Fresh evidence of bear - paw prints, claw marks on trees, roots dug up - is
common, and bear are frequently seen snatching salmon headed upstream to spawn.
Groups hiking here carry shotguns and pepper spray just in case.
Aside from some small-scale logging, mining, and fishing, there was little
industrial activity here up through World War II. To encourage wood-fiber
production and increased population (both seen as important goals in the early
cold-war period), the federal government sought to promote development in what
was still a territory by offering long-term contracts to log the national
forest.
The results were 50-year agreements providing more than 13.5 billion board-feet
of timber to two large corporations, which built what were then state-of-the-art
pulp mills in Sitka and Ketchikan. One of those companies (the Japanese-owned
Alaska Pulp Corporation) closed its doors in Sitka in 1993, claiming that Uncle
Sam had failed to provide sufficient timber for the mill to stay in business.
It's now suing the government for $1.2 billion.
Now the focus is on the Ketchikan Pulp Company, a subsidiary of Louisiana-
Pacific Corporation, one of the largest US forest-products companies. KPC
produces "dissolving pulp" used in materials from rayon and cellophane to
pharmaceuticals and food thickeners. Some 95 percent of its product is sold
abroad (77 percent to Asia).
Critics say the company (with acquiescence if not encouragement from the Forest
Service) has caused environmental damage by over-cutting the woods and polluting
at its pulp mill. They're particularly critical of KPC's contract, which lasts
through 2004.
"It's an exclusive, one-of-its-kind monopoly," says Bart Koehler, executive
director of the Juneau-based Southeast Alaska Conservation Council.
The company - and most of the business establishment in Ketchikan - insist that
KPC is a good corporate citizen providing the backbone of their economy. If
problems cropped up in the past, supporters say, these were largely the result
of a new environmental ethic. Company officials insist the only way to adjust to
this new ethic is for Congress to extend the contract another 15 years so KPC
can invest $200 million to modernize its mill.
Without such a contract extension, warns KPC president Ralph Lewis, "The
viability of our mill is threatened along with the economy of our entire
region."
Alaska's congressional delegation - Sen. Ted Stevens, Sen. Frank Murkowski, and
Rep. Don Young (all Republicans) - are pushing legislation that would extend the
contract. Mr. Young also has filed a bill that would turn the Tongass National
Forest over to Alaska.
KPC worked closely with lawmakers drafting the bill. "We didn't actually write
it, but we certainly had input," says KPC spokesman Troy Reinhart.
The clear warning here is that Louisiana-Pacific, which has had other business
problems, could shut down the KPC mill. Regional officials say that would be bad
news for the local economy.
"The effects of a timber decline on our members would be devastating," says
Ernesta Ballard, president of the Ketchikan Chamber of Commerce and an
environmental consultant (to KPC and others) and former regional director for
the Environmental Protection Agency.
Mill supporters say KPC provides 25 percent of the area's payroll in direct and
related jobs, putting $5 million a month into the local economy. Mill wages
average $45,000 per year and last year-round.
Other economic analysts assert that timber plays a relatively smaller - and
declining - part of the region's economy.
In a recent report, ECONorthwest, a research firm in Eugene, Ore., that has done
work for environmental groups, noted that "in 1995, those directly employed in
the timber industry accounted for less than 6 percent of the region's total
employment, and many of those were nonresidents."
"Fishing, tourism, and the quality of the natural environment contribute to the
regional economy's diversity and strength," states this report. "Clearly,
southeast Alaska's economy is diverse and strong enough to absorb reductions in
timber harvest yet keep growing."
Still, even the most adamant environmentalists acknowledge there would have to
be considerable adjustment if KPC pulls out. "I'm not going to minimize the
situation," says Mr. Koehler of the Southeast Alaska Conservation Council. "If
that pulp mill closes, there's going to be a lot of pain and suffering."
KPC cleans up its act
While the company promises a more environmentally friendly future, its past is
spotted. Following an EPA investigation that began during the Bush
administration, KPC last year pleaded guilty to one felony and 13 misdemeanor
violations of the Clean Water Act for illegally discharging pollutants into Ward
Cove. The company was fined $6.1 million and placed on five years' probation.
"It is true we have had problems in the past and for those we apologize,"
company president Ralph Lewis told a Senate hearing in July. But "KPC has new
management, and we are excited about the future and are ready to move forward."
In any case, turning wood chips into pulp remains an inherently messy and
potentially poisonous business. Under the federal Toxic Chemical Release
Inventory program, KPC must regularly report on its use of (and any pollution
which results from) nine chemicals: nitric acid, phosphoric acid, chlorine,
chloroform, hydrochloric acid, sulfuric acid, ammonia, methanol, and formic acid
- all processed, manufactured, or used in the production of pulp.
Company officials claim great strides in improving the mill's operation, and
have set as a goal becoming "totally chlorine-free" by the end of 1998. This
would remove the danger of dioxin, a toxic carcinogen associated with
pulpmaking.
"I've seen a lot of progress with them," says Ms. Ballard, the former EPA
official now helping KPC design a new system for treating its wastewater.
Harangue over harvest
But it's away from the mill and out in the vast forests of the Tongass where
most of the debate focuses.
Under the 50-year contract, KPC is supposed to be able to buy 192.5 million
board-feet of timber each year from the Forest Service. (A board-foot measures
12 inches by 12 inches by 1 inch.)
The Forest Service normally designs 10- to 15-year management plans for each
national forest. Because of environmental concerns, as reflected in reform
legislation passed by Congress in 1990, the Forest Service amended the plan then
in effect. The result was more restrictions on logging - what KPC complains were
"unilateral modifications" - resulting in a reduced timber harvest of about 159
million board-feet a year. This led to lost jobs and periodic shutdowns of the
company's operations. The company is suing in the US Court of Claims over that
issue, and so far has won a settlement of $6 million.
Environmentalists and some inside the Forest Service, on the other hand, charge
that the agency has been too compliant in allowing unsustainable logging that
has threatened wildlife habitat.
"Substantial damage is being done to wildlife and fisheries," says K. J.
Metcalf, who retired after working 26 years in the Forest Service. "We need to
move away from industrial clear-cutting to a more sustainable forestry."
Although some biologists warn that local populations of wolves and goshawks are
in decline, no species so far has been officially listed as endangered. But as
Bradley Powell, Ketchikan area supervisor for Tongass, points out, "The issue is
not numbers but distribution and (habitat) fragmentation."
In other words, some species need wide territories over which to range. When
clearcuts and logging roads start to spread, this has an adverse impact on such
species. Matthew Kirchoff, biologist with the Alaska Department of Fish and
Game, notes that 50 years ago there were just 15 miles of road on Prince of
Wales Island. Today, there are 3,500.
Unlike the lower 48 states, where much logging is selective, tree-cutting on the
Tongass is virtually all in clearcuts. Proponents say the heavy rainfall (more
than 200 inches per year in some areas) and rich soil mean quick forest
regeneration.
"You have to beat back the trees," quips KPC spokesman Troy Reinhart.
New trees may come back quickly, others say, but after a few years this even-age
forest forms such a thick canopy that other plants, which provide food for
smaller mammals, disappear. This can disrupt the natural relationship between
predator and prey found in old-growth forests.
"Basically, when you go into a 100-year rotation, you never get old-growth,"
says Mr. Kirchhoff. "The whole dynamic between wolves and deer is changing
because of the changing landscape."
Forest management feud
The Forest Service recently issued its new draft management plan for the
Tongass. The plan includes more wildlife habitat reserves, wider buffers along
beaches and estuaries, and leaving some trees standing in clearcuts to improve
habitat in second-growth forests. Agency officials assert that their plan will
meet the obligation to provide sufficient timber under the 50-year contract.
But the Forest Service also opposes the legislation mill officials say they need
to stay in business here. "It's more than an extension," says Mr. Powell. "It
also changes quite a few features."
The Forest Service expected and received a large amount of feedback to its
proposal. Hundreds of people showed up at hearings in small communities.
Thousands have sent in written comments.
Many industry backers say the Forest Service is overly optimistic in predicting
how much timber can be produced from the acreage targeted for harvesting under
the plan. "They figured they could get more volume out of fewer trees," says
Dick Coose, who retired after 32 years with the Forest Service and now heads a
grass-roots group supportive of the industry.
But as is usually the case, the Forest Service finds itself with critics on the
other side as well.
As part of the planning process, a "peer review committee" of university and
other scientists was asked to go over habitat-conservation measures the Forest
Service was considering for the Tongass.
In a recent statement, several of these scientists warned that "logging and
related activities ... pose a significant risk to the viability of populations
of several species associated with old-growth forests." This group recommends
moving away from clearcutting, and it warns that local populations of goshawk
and wolf (both considered important indicators of forest health) could be in
danger of extinction if forestry methods are not changed to mimic nature.
Earlier this month, a group of scientists and resource managers from state and
federal land-management agencies took an even harder line.
Critics from within
The Association of Forest Service Employees for Environmental Ethics is a
national organization begun about six years ago. Some of these workers have
become public whistle-blowers, but most remain anonymous for fear of
retribution.
In its detailed analysis of the Forest Service proposal for the Tongass, AFSEEE
recommends canceling Ketchikan Pulp Company's 50-year contract, establishing
large biological reserves here, setting up strong watershed buffers to protect
fisheries, harvesting selectively rather than clearcutting, and giving harvested
forests 200 to 300 years to grow back.
"Today, competing uses on forestlands preclude the dominance of one industry
over all other uses," states the AFSEEE report. "The Tongass will never return
to the era of large-scale industrial logging.... We must now ask how we can
manage for biological diversity and other sustainable uses and still provide
commodities."
"My feeling is that the cautionary approach is best," says Jackie Canterbury, a
Forest Service biologist for six years before resigning to become AFSEEE's
Alaska coordinator based in Ketchikan.
Speaking out against her former employer has not been easy, especially living in
a town so long dependent on timber and so stirred up over its future. There have
been ominous phone calls and a bullet through her front window. "I would be
crazy to say I'm not scared," she says.
With national elections this year, the time for any KPC contract extension is
running short. Company officials say they're making contingency plans for
layoffs. In recent days, representatives of KPC, the Alaska congressional
delegation, Alaska Gov. Tony Knowles's office, and the Clinton administration
have been huddled in Washington weighing jobs and environmental protection on
the Tongass.
"The basic issue is still how to manage those resources for the long term," says
Bradley Powell of the Forest Service. "It's all about finding the appropriate
balance."