B.C.'s old-growth protections come under renewed scrutiny

B.C.'s forests ministry has deniedreports, published by the BBC and others, that old-growth trees from the province are still being burned as pellets for fuelin the U.K.

The province also pushedback on environmentalists' claims that a leaked old-growth forests map suggests it is playing a "shell game" to allow the harvesting of old-growth trees meant to be protected.

"Whole forests of any kind are not being turned into pellets by the forest sector," said a Ministry of Forests spokesperson in a March 8 email."Reports that whole forests and quality sawlogs are being turned into pellets by the forestry industry are simply false."

Instead, the ministry said, all wood pellets in B.C. are made "almost entirely from waste fibre" such as sawdust, shavings, and leftover wood from logging, which would otherwise have to be burned.

But a forest ecologistin Prince George, B.C., saiddespite claims to the contrary, the province is failing to uphold itscommitment to preserve swaths of old-growth trees.

"It's actually thousands of load of logs ... comingfrom cut blocks containing large areas of old growth forest," said Michelle Connolly, director of Conservation North, in an interview with CBC's Daybreak North on March 4.

It's just the latest scrutiny of B.C.'s promiseto protect old-growth forests. Controversy resurfaced last month whenConservation North co-authored a reportalleging U.K.biofuel company Drax Grouphas continued burning logs and forestry wastefrom B.C.'s rarest old-growth forests.

The report's authors allegenearly 40 per centof the areasDraxsourced its woodfrom last yearwere old-growth forests, about half of which were within areas the province had temporarily halted logging, known aspriority deferral areas which the province deemthe most at risk.

The report comes nearly nearly two years after investigations byCBC'sThe Fifth EstateandBBC'sPanoramarevealed Drax's operationsdepended onlogging in rare old-growth areasin B.C.

Last month, BBC published a new article, reporting the company's allegedpractice has continued.

WATCH |Wood from B.C. forests is being burned for electricity billed as green:

The Big Burn

2 years ago

Duration 45:10

Amid the ongoing fight to protect British Columbias forests, The Fifth Estate examines how the province has become a leading exporter of wood pellets being burned to fuel energy needs in the U.K., where some activists and politicians say both the U.K. and Canada have made a mistake in supporting the industry.

Draxdefends its B.C. wood sourcing

The fibre Drax produces at its 12 pellet mills in B.C.are burned to produce fuel for electricity in its U.K. power station, roughly 250 kilometresnorth of London.

The company says on its website itsconverted North Yorkshirecoal plantgenerates14 terawatt-hours of energy a year, about a quarter of all electricity generatedinB.C. in 2023.

In an email, Draxsustainability director Joe Aquino said the firm is "confident" its "biomass is sustainable and legally harvested." He said itonly uses sawmill residue, and wasteleft behind from logging,including tree tops and branches.

"Ifwe don't exist, that material gets left in the roadside and it gets disposed of through incineration,"Aquinotold CBC'sDaybreak North on March 6. "If we don't exist, then sawmills have no outlets to send that material."

B.C.'s Ministry of Forests said what Drax is doing is legal and does not harm protected old-growth forests. A ministry spokespersonsaid Drax trades "quality timber,from their timber license area, to a sawmill in exchange for mill residuals" to turn into fuel pellets.

The provincedefines old-growth trees as those at least 140 years old in B.C.'s Interior, and 250 years old on the coast.

In 2021, the B.C. government introduced a processto temporarily stop logging in selected old-growth forests known as deferral areas,"a temporary measure to prevent irreversible biodiversity loss."

Deferral areas areprotected from loggingfor a period of twoto fouryears,during which the provinceplans to develop new strategies that put ecosystems' health beforetimber management,according to B.C.'sOld Growth Strategic Review,

The ministrysays 2.4 million hectares of forests have beendeferred so far in partnership withFirst Nations.

'Erroneous truck loads'

According to Aquino,last OctoberDraxstopped getting its wood fibre directly from logging sitesthat includedeferral areas, "in response topolicy changes" by the province.

"What Conservation North was bringing forward was prior to October 2023," he said.

Butthe group's reportconcludedthe company was still sourcingrare old-growth logs three months later.

"We anticipated Draxwould say that, and extended the analysis into this year," Connolly wrote in an email to Daybreak Northin responseto Aquino's statement.

Conolly said the groupusedB.C.'s Harvest Billing Systemdatabaseto assess how muchbiomass arrivedat Drax's pellet mills from B.C. forests.

Daybreak North8:12Report says old growth material ending up in biofuel pellets

Conservation North wants an end to logging in priority deferral areas.

In an email, the companyacknowledged nine truck loads with wood from old-growth deferral areas hadbeen "mistakenly delivered" to its pellet plantssince October.

"For context this was nine out of almost 8,000 truckloads delivered to Drax's pellet plants" between November and January,the companywrote in an email.

"The erroneous truck loads were identified internally at Drax shortly after delivery," the company said, adding it's worked "to reducethe risk of this happening in future."

But Connolly said Drax is only a small part of the problem; other companiesharvest the timber that Drax relies on for wood pellets.

"The real problem is that old-growth priority deferral areas are being logged for other products as well," she said.

Leaked map raises allegations of ministry bias

Thoseconcerns were echoed by Ben Parfitt, a resource policy analyst with theCanadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA), who said the wood-pellet controversyhighlights a larger issue around how removals are made from old-growth deferral areas.

"There has been logging that has happened in some of the deferral areas," he said.

Healleged the province has longbeenbiasedtowardthe logging industry, and in areport published last weekarguedthe Ministry of Forests wants to allow even more logging in old-growth forests.

Based on government old-growthmapping datasent anonymously to the CCPA, Parfitt said officials "behind the scenes" removed 55 per cent of the old-growth deferral areas recommendedin 2021 by theOld Growth Technical Advisory Panel (TAP),a provincially appointed groupthat includes foresters and biologists.

According to a statement fromMinister of Forests Bruce Ralston, some deferral areas were removed afterconsulting First Nations.

"Some First Nations support TAP-identified deferrals," Ralston's statementsaid. "Others have said that based on their expertise, alternative old growth land outside of TAP areas should be deferred instead.

"Some First Nations don't support proposed deferrals and prefer to continue forestry activity in their territory."

Daybreak North11:28Biomass battle

Drax responds to old growth concerns

According to Parfitt, some of the removed areasheld some of B.C.'sbiggest trees, which the TAP hadwarned were at the highest risk of being logged.

The ministry said tree size isn't the only factor considered when "determining the ecological value of an old-growth forest deferral." The province also considers how big such a deferral area is, whether it's near a waterway, local species or rare habitats.

In the meantime, the province says it is taking action on all the recommendations of the Old Growth Strategic Review.

"We will keep working alongside First Nations, communities, advocates and the sector," Ralston's statement said, "to conserve more ancient forests for our children and grandchildren."