The article “In the battle for logging in the NH National Forest, climate change is at the center” (Page A1, October 28) focuses on the environmental tradeoffs of logging on public lands. But holistic, sustainable land management in New England relies on private forest lands (80 percent of the region’s forests are privately owned), which acts as a connective tissue between public lands. This dynamic presents a tremendous opportunity for stakeholders to work together to protect and increase the less than 1 percent of old-growth forest that remains in the Northeast. As Erin Douglas’ article points out, old forests sequester more carbon than their young and middle-aged counterparts and can halt biodiversity loss.

Old-growth forests are an important part of a diversified land-use regime, of the type approved by the Wildlands, woodlands, agricultural lands and communities collective. Our organization, Northeast Wilderness Trust, works with other conservation groups to ensure that “wildlands”, reserves where forests are free to evolve and age, make up at least 10 percent of this mix, compared to 3.3 percent today.

With the right level of commitment, we can secure a future of resilient, climate-stabilizing wild forests within the broader context of economic needs and uses.

Jon Leibowitz

President and CEO

North East Wilderness Trust

Montpelier, Vermont.

We cannot afford to choose between locally sourced wood products and increasing forest carbon storage. About 7 million people live in Massachusetts. We use nearly 360 million cubic feet of wood each year. We need to find ways to manage our forests in a climate-smart way to produce biomaterials like wood, otherwise we will end up using more carbon-intensive steel and concrete and contributing to cooking the planet ( or ask others to supply our wood without knowing where it comes from).

There are ways to manage our forests to support ecological health, store carbon and produce climate-friendly wood products. The New England Forestry Foundation Exemplary forest management standards achieve these goals while recognizing that wildlands are an essential part of the landscape.

The foundation research shows that climate-smart forestry across New England, combined with the positive impacts of this approach which would accrue to the construction industry, could keep more than 646 million tonnes of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere over the next 30 years, equivalent to about 30 percent of the emissions reductions needed for New England to reach net zero emissions by 2050.

The right approaches can store more carbon in our forests while providing renewable wood to build our local bioeconomy and produce more of what we need where we live.

Andrea Colnes

Deputy Director and Climate Researcher

New England Forestry Foundation

Littleton

I find it hard to believe that in this day and age the Globe would use a title like “Can logging in New Hampshire help fight climate change?”. Erin Douglas’ article even cites the various equivocations of logging supporters on the subject.

Perhaps the most prominent critique of logging comes from Jonathan Thompson, director of research at Harvard Forest, who, as Douglas paraphrased, said that “when it comes to for old trees, the calculation is not complicated: if it took 100 years to grow the tree, for example, then it will generally take a hundred more to replace the one stored. carbon.”

Those of us working to end indiscriminate logging on public lands have been arguing this for decades.

Do we really need to constantly remind ourselves that we are in the middle of a climate crisis? We don’t have 100 years to wait for destroyed forests to grow back and store the released carbon. Logging needs to stop now, and starting on public lands is a good start.

Don Ogden

Florence

The writer is the co-founder and co-host of “The Enviro Show” on Valley Free Radio (WXOJ-LP).