Following an executive order by President Donald Trump to increase timber production and encourage more logging across the nation, the U.S. Department of Agriculture has rolled back environmental protections, opening 59% of federally protected forests for logging efforts.

“This is largely just an antiregulatory approach that will probably, in some places, accelerate timber production,” said Courtney Schultz, a forest and natural resource policy professor and director of the CSU Climate Initiative. “But that doesn’t necessarily mean it’ll be done in a way that is also looking at all the other things on public lands we’re supposed to be protecting or that (it) will lead to long-term sustainability for timber producing companies or communities.”

The executive order encourages agencies to fast-track timber production through bypassing traditional environmental assessments and ignores the complexities of forest management.

“It’s a very complex system, and today what we have on a lot of these lands are trees growing up that aren’t particularly valuable because the high-value trees have been cut,” Schultz said. “To me, this is a pretty single-minded approach that’s very focused on getting the cut out, which is a political goal to support commodity production from our public lands.”

Matt McCombs, state forester and director of the Colorado State Forest Service, said 65% of Colorado forests are federally managed, meaning the state is majorly impacted by federal policy changes, especially when it comes to fire mitigation and environmental stewardship.

“In Colorado, we’re not a timber production state; we’re a stewardship state,” McCombs said. “One of my colleagues once said to me, ‘We don’t grow trees in Colorado. We grow water. … We grow recreation and wildlife habitat.’”

McCombs emphasized that Colorado has never prioritized maximizing timber production, but more so preserving ecological systems and community safety through science-based strategies to address issues, including wildfires.

“There’s a lot of science that underwrites all of the activities that we conduct,” McCombs said. “What we’re trying to do is create an environment in Colorado where fire can reestablish its natural role in the natural cycle but not undermine the economic and ecologic benefits that the people rely on.”

Wildfire researchers are raising concerns regarding how increased logging could impact fire behavior and forest structure in the future.

“We’re doubling down on this shared stewardship approach, cross-boundary, at the scale of the problem through shared priority settings to make sure Colorado communities are safe and that our forests are resilient … (and) are as ready as they can be in an environment where the climate is warming and the population continues to expand deeper into the woods.” –Matt McCombs, state forester

Nicole Vieira, an assistant professor in the Honors Program who has researched wildfires, ecology and environmental ethics, discussed that although logging has been proven to reduce fire danger, second-growth forests where trees have already been logged may create fuel for wildfires, making them more difficult to manage.

“It’s all about fuel; in second-growth forests, when trees are young, close together and not fire-adapted, you have very high fuel loads,” Vieira said. “The other problem with logging is that sometimes they’ll leave slash piles, meaning that limbs, broken parts, things like that will just be left. … The tradeoff for that is that when you leave that debris on the forest floor, it creates habitat for things like small mammals.”

Schultz pointed out that existing regulations are not the reason behind a lack of logging, even though it has been previously effective in reducing fire danger.

“There’s quite a lot of land that’s already approved through the environmental impact assessment process, and there are no companies bidding on it,” Schultz said. “So even though this executive order is telling everyone to go out and harvest more timber, I think most scientists would agree that some fuel thinning followed by prescribed burning is good in terms of fire danger.”

Additionally, Vieira said the executive order contradicts the government’s prior actions, as the Trump administration has laid off a significant number of federal employees who would make forest management and increased timber production possible.

“In reality, it’s being used to try and bypass regulations and bypass the process,” Vieira said. “I don’t think an executive order is the way to do it, and the irony is if (President Trump) wants to fast-track things through an executive order, he’s getting rid of all the federal employees necessary to be in the office to actually fast-track those projects.”

Despite concerns regarding federal action, McCombs said the Colorado State Forest Service remains committed to collaborative and science-based forest management in the face of political challenges.

“We’re doubling down on this shared stewardship approach, cross-boundary, at the scale of the problem through shared priority settings to make sure Colorado communities are safe and that our forests are resilient … (and) are as ready as they can be in an environment where the climate is warming and the population continues to expand deeper into the woods,” McCombs said.

Reach Laila Shekarchian at science@collegian.com or on Twitter @CSUCollegian.