Biden Administration Pulls The Plug On Old-Growth Forest Protection Plan

The president will exit office without securing lasting safeguards for the nation’s most ancient trees, which play a key role in mitigating climate change.

The Biden administration on Tuesday withdrew a proposal that would have protected the nation’s oldest, most carbon-rich forests from future logging.

Forest Service Chief Randy Moore announced the decision in a memo to agency staff. The move follows a multiyear process in which the Forest Service, an agency with a long history of prioritizing timber production, was accused of dragging its feet to respond to an executive order that President Joe Biden signed in April 2021, which tasked the agency with crafting policies to better conserve and restore America’s old-growth forests.

Ancient forests help fight climate change by sequestering massive amounts of planet-warming greenhouse gases in their trees and soil. A coalition of dozens of environmental groups had lobbied the Biden administration to protect remaining old-growth stands across federal lands for their natural climate benefits.

But while Biden made safeguarding these ecosystems a key pillar of his climate agenda, he will exit office without getting lasting protections across the finish line. Nonetheless, in a press release earlier this week announcing the creation of two new national monuments in California, Biden highlighted his executive order on old-growth among a long list of conservation wins.

In his memo and an accompanying statement on Tuesday, Moore said that the Forest Service had learned a great deal about old-growth forests, including the threats these ecosystems face, but that the service would not advance the proposal before the end of Biden’s term in the White House.