US Northwest federal logging limits and the shift of timber cutting
Short record: the main facts, with sources. A full case file has not been prepared.
Federal logging on Pacific Northwest forests fell from 12.7 billion board-feet in 1987 to 1.7 billion in 2002. A 2019 letter by Brian Murray confirms an earlier finding that more than 80% of the blocked volume moved to other North American forests, mainly the US South.
- Large forest companies and southeastern private landowners — moved cutting to private land, Canada and overseas; the 13 southeastern states came to supply two-thirds of the national harvest, and private-land cutting from Virginia to Texas doubled since the late 1970s
- Small forest towns in the Northwest — more than 200 mills closed and wood-products employment in Oregon and Washington fell 30%
- Natural forests of the US South — the sources say pine plantation replaced them as cutting moved south
What happened
Federal timber harvest on national forests fell from 12.7 billion board-feet in 1987 to 1.7 billion in 2002, according to figures cited from the Seattle Times.
More than 200 Northwest lumber mills closed between 1989 and 2004, and wood-products employment in Oregon and Washington fell 30%, according to the same figures.
Wear and Murray (2004) estimated that more than 80% of the blocked volume shifted to other North American forests, largely the US South; Brian Murray's 2019 letter confirms the finding.
Murray's letter adds that southern forests store less carbon, so carbon leakage was smaller than volume leakage; another model put carbon leakage below 10% in the Northwest and at 20–30% in the South.
In court and with insurers
Lawsuits and rulings
Insurers
What we don't know
Nature
- Not measured Harm to nature: The record holds no measurement of harm to nature.
Record
- Insufficient Reported but not verified: the 1994 Northwest Forest Plan cut logging by 80% across about 24 million acres.
- Insufficient Reported but not verified: the spotted owl was listed as threatened in 1990, and court rulings that followed nearly stopped federal logging.
- Disputed Reported but not verified: old-growth remaining at the time of the decision was disputed; the Forest Service found 4.3 million acres in 1991 and the Wilderness Society 2 million, while conservation groups say only 15–20% of native old growth remains.
- Insufficient Reported but not verified: 30,000 direct jobs were lost in 1990–2000 according to a Forest Service report, about 19,000 of them before 1994; only about 400 of the 11,000 losses after 1994 were linked to lower federal logging.
- Insufficient Reported but not verified: Weyerhaeuser and other large private owners gained from the shift in cutting.
- Insufficient Reported but not verified: the spotted owl population kept falling because of invasive barred owls.
- None on record Not reviewed: the full 2004 Wear and Murray paper; the 80% figure comes from Murray's 2019 letter.
Did the harm stop?
Not stated in the sources reviewed.
Who paid?
Not stated in the sources reviewed.
Sources
Communities and civil society
- Letter from B. Murray to Pacific Forest Trust on volume leakage and carbonPacific Forest Trust · 2019
Connected cases
- New Mexico prescribed burn in 2022 became the state's largest fire United States · 2022
- US Forest Service (Government) — here: managed the national forests where federal harvest fell between 1987 and 2002; there: Agency that carried out the prescribed burn