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WNC environmental groups want Nantahala-Pisgah Forest Plan changed post-Helene

The Nantahala and Pisgah National Forests both cover over a million acres. Pictured is the Nantahala National Forest in Otto.
Lilly Knoepp
The Nantahala and Pisgah National Forests both cover over a million acres. Pictured is the Nantahala National Forest in Otto.

This coverage is made possible through a partnership between BPR and Grist, a nonprofit environmental media organization.

In light of Hurricane Helene, Western North Carolina conservationists are asking the U.S. government to change its Nantahala-Pisgah Forest Plan to further restrict logging activity.

The Forest Plan was finished and approved in 2023, but environmentalists argue amendments are needed, saying the damage from Helene is so extensive that keeping the previously planned amount of land open to logging will destroy wildlife habitats and remove too many trees, which are critical to reducing carbon in the atmosphere. In a letter to the Forest Service this week, a coalition of local environmental groups said the agency’s forest management plans in WNC don’t go far enough to prepare forests for climate disasters.

Helene’s disruption to North Carolina’s national forests was enormous, damaging 187,000 acres of public land and leading to eroded riverbanks, loss of wildlife, and closed trails and roads. Previous storms, like Tropical Storm Fred, have also caused severe damage to the region’s forests, and thanks to climate change, disasters may come more frequently.

Federal law says forest management plans may be revised when conditions have significantly changed. In their letter, the groups – which include MountainTrue and the Center for Biological Diversity among others – said that Helene unleashed hundreds of years’ worth of damage. They argue it constitutes a big enough change to amend the Forest Plan, which calls for a five-fold increase in logging to mimic natural disturbances.

Southern Environmental Law Center senior attorney Sam Evans said the disturbance caused by Helene should be reason enough for the Forest Service to consider leaving larger tracts of land alone to recover. “We’ve already got this huge amount of disturbance to the landscape,” he said. “If we add more from logging, is that going to push rare species closer to the brink?”

The Forest Service’s original plan was developed over 10 years through an intensive public input process. The plan, which drew over 20,000 comments, increased wilderness designations and old growth protections. However, local forest advocates were concerned that its logging allowances went too far, allocating 100,000 acres to timber production.

Adam Rondeau, a public affairs specialist with the Forest Service, said the agency won't be able to make changes to the plan until they know more about Helene's damage, which is difficult to assess because of the scale of woody debris on the ground. "We’re working on plans to address the heavy fuel load on the ground in order to mitigate potentially devastating wildfires—a massive risk for our neighboring communities," Rondeau told BPR. "Once we address the immediate priorities, we will assess how Helene has affected the administrative aspects of the forest plan."

Katie Myers is BPR's Climate Reporter.