High in the trees that have been growing in the Walbran Valley on Vancouver Island for up to 1,000 years, unique colonies of insects and invertebrates are thriving.

Carpets of soil which develop in the massive branches of the old-growth trees contain a plethora of species not found anywhere else on Earth and, since 1995, University of Victoria entomologist Neville Winchester has climbed more than 2,000 trees to document and catalogue this life in the tree-tops.

“These ancient forests are a repository of biodiversity,” said Winchester, who has had more than a dozen beetle mites, aphids and flies named after him and who is giving a public talk this Friday at 6:30 p.m. at the University of Victoria.

Together with UVic graduate students, Winchester has conducted one of the most extensive canopy research projects in North America, using ropes to scale trees the equivalent of 18-storeys high in the Carmanah and Walbran valleys.

 “Then I take my mom’s bulb planter and take a sample of the suspended soils, which can be up to 60 centimetres in depth,” he said.

Despite overwhelming scientific evidence of unique ecosystems, Winchester is fighting a battle he thought had been won two decades ago when massive protests and demonstrations — part of the ‘War in the Woods’ that marked the 1980s and 1990s in B.C. — erupted over plans to log Carmanah Walbran.

At that time, Winchester was already doing canopy research and, when the government of the day responded to overwhelming public opposition and created the Carmanah Walbran Provincial Park, taking in 16,450 hectares of the old growth forest, he believed the war was over.

But now, part of the Central Walbran, just outside the park boundary, is under threat.

“I have the feeling that ‘here we go again.’ The same issues that were present then have surfaced again. They have been simmering for 20 years,” said Winchester, who finds it difficult to believe that politicians cannot look at the evidence and ban old-growth logging in the area.

“It’s greed, ignorance and arrogance. The scientific evidence is out there and it shows that these areas and these species are essential to protect biodiversity,” he said.

“By taking these trees down or by causing disruption you are committing species to go extinct. . . . Who would feel good about species going extinct just because we have mismanaged a resource? That’s the bottom line.”

Ancient Forest Alliance (AFA) Photographer & Campaigner TJ Watt standing beside the Castle Giant in the unprotected Castle Grove.

The province has granted Surrey-based Teal Jones Group a permit for a 3.2-hectare cutblock east of Carmanah Walbran Park.

The cutblock is in the 500-hectare Central Walbran where, unlike the valley further south which is tattered with cutblocks, there is contiguous old-growth.

“It’s where our forests reach their most magnificent proportions,” said Ken Wu of the Ancient Forest Alliance.

“These are the classic giants. The biggest and the best — and some of the largest remaining tracts and finest old growth western red cedars are in areas such as Castle Grove, together with old-growth dependent species such as the Queen Charlotte goshawk and marbled murrelet,” Wu said, emphasizing the importance of these areas for tourism as well as biodiversity.

Jackie Korn stands beside a large redcedar stump cut by Teal-Jones in the Walbran Valley in 2014. Photo: TJ Watt.

Business leaders in Port Renfrew have called on the B.C. government to immediately ban logging in the unprotected part of the Walbran Valley, saying tall tree tourism is now a multi-million dollar business and the highest value would come from stopping further logging of old growth trees.

At the heart of the problem is the original configuration of the park, said Torrance Coste of the Wilderness Committee.

A large chunk, surrounded by park and known colloquially as “The Bite,” was left without protection.

“It was a big concession to logging interests. When the park was laid down, there was no consensus or agreement from the environmental side,” Coste said.

Logging has already degraded old-growth on the south side of Walbran Creek, and environmentalists are not happy about Teal Jones plans for seven more cutblocks in that area, but the line in the sand is the approved cutblock on the north side of the river, said Coste, who wants to see the 486-hectare northern section of The Bite protected.

Protests started in the area in November, but, three weeks later, a court injunction restricted access and stopped protesters from interfering with logging operations.

On January 4, in a B.C. Supreme Court ruling, the injunction was extended until the end of March.

Coste said that, although he and the Wilderness Committee are named in the injunction, the role of the group has been to record and advocate, not participate in blockades.

However, he believes the injunction is heavy-handed and designed to discourage people from going into the Walbran Valley.

There is a great need for eyes on the ground and for British Columbians to let the province know that it is not acceptable to log some of the last low-elevation old-growth on southern Vancouver Island, he said.

The Milky Way cradled by silhouettes of ancient redcedars in the Central Walbran Valley. Photo by TJ Watt.

A spokesman for the Ministry of Forests, Lands and Natural Resource Operations said in an e-mail that the ministry facilitated a meeting between the company and environmental groups in December to discuss how concerns could be addressed and another meeting is scheduled for next month.

The 3.2-hectare area that Teal Jones plans to log is part of a special resource management zone, which limits cutblock size to five hectares, and the company will use helicopter harvesting, meaning there will be no trails, roads or use of heavy equipment, the province said.

Conserving old growth and biodiversity are important parts of the province’s long-term resource management plans, said the spokesman.

“Of the 1.9 million hectares of Crown forest on Vancouver Island, 840,125 hectares are considered old growth, but only 313,000 hectares are available for timber harvesting,” the e-mail reponse read.

Coste remains hopeful that the province will have a change of heart.

“Nowhere else on Vancouver Island do we have the opportunity to protect such a large tract of contiguous old-growth,” he said.

“It’s an opportunity we absolutely can’t afford to miss.”

Winchester is hoping science will convince the government of the need for protection and he will publicly share findings from his years of research at a lecture Friday Jan.29, 6.30 p.m. at the University of Victoria Student Union Building Upper Lounge.

Admission is by donation with proceeds going to the Friends of Carmanah/Walbran campaign to protect the Central Walbran Ancient Forest.

Main Image: Looking up an ancient redcedar tree in proposed logging cutblock 4405. Central Walbran Ancient Forest. TJ Watt.

The Narwhal’s reporters are telling environment stories you won’t read about anywhere else. Stay in the loop by signing up for our free weekly dose of independent journalism.

Ken Wu is executive director of Majority for a Sustainable Society (MASS) and co-founder of the Ancient Forest Alliance. 

For Part 1 of this article, click here.

In the first part of this article, I described what specific challenges the climate movement faces when confronting its own limiting tendencies as well as industry funded public relations campaigns. In this second part I outline what I think are four essential ways the climate movement must evolve in order to overcome these obstacles.

FIRST, we must become a lot more political, in the sense that it’s fundamentally the laws, policies, and agreements that shape our greater society and economy. And it’s our society and economy which are the foundations of our personal lifestyles. What is available, affordable, practical, and possible in our lifestyles is largely a product of the society in which we live – what clean energy sources exist at what price relative to dirty energy, how available public transit is, how well or poorly our cities are designed for walking, cycling, and accessing our needs, how energy efficient our buildings are, and so on.  

No individual is an island unto himself; the way we live is fundamentally shaped by the economy and society in which our lifestyles are nested.  

Western individualism sees each person as an island divorced from society and economic circumstances. As a result, many North American environmentalists instinctively emphasize efforts towards personal lifestyle purity as a fundamental remedy to environmental problems despite being in a system that, at this time, is based on fossil fuels in almost every regard (hence the need for larger societal change). Needless to say this is a virtually impossible task that plays well into the hands of fossil fuel advocates who are bound to find “inconsistencies” and “hypocrisy” in the personal lifestyles of all those who care about the fate of the planet!
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Government regulations that shift our energy choices at their sources, that is, at the point of resource extraction or energy production, from dirty to clean energy, or from low to high energy efficiency in our technologies, will automatically be incorporated into the lifestyles of all consumers, whether or not they are environmental idealists.
 
In addition, studies show that voluntary or “non-compulsory” methods to reduce carbon emissions have a minor impact and real progress occurs through regulations and tax shifting. If we want to change both corporate and individual behaviour, putting an escalating price on carbon, banning coal-fired plants, and strengthening regulations and standards are vital.

That’s not to say we shouldn’t pursue personal lifestyle reforms – just that if the goal is to actually change the outcome for the climate, the major leaps forward will come through regulations, government policies, and political action.
 
SECOND, as much as the climate change movement emphasizes the problems, we must also emphasize the solutions and a positive vision of a sustainable, low carbon society. That is, how a low carbon society would support ramped-up green businesses and jobs, create more livable cities, foster greater community, improve our health, support global peace and stability, and sustain the natural diversity and beauty of the planet. 
 
After repeatedly hearing about impending disaster, many people tune out. We can’t psychologically stay in emergency mode forever.  If the “inconvenient truth” is always a negative crisis message, it’ll be easier to hear the “reassuring lies” over the long run. However, if the truth is also a positive alternative vision – that we can have a better quality of life in a sustainable society based on clean energy, efficiency, smart planning and liveable communities – it’s a message most people can stay with and promote. That’s not to downplay the need to get the facts out about the real crisis – just that we must lead our message with positive solutions more often.
 
THIRD, our positive solutions must emphasize the economy, on how people can make a living. The economy is usually the top concern in public opinion polls, with the environment often lagging far behind except in limited “peak years” like 1990 and 2006. As long as the environmental movement fails to emphasize how people can realistically make a living in lieu of stopping destructive industries, it will stay in the margins, always too weak to transform the status quo. Publicly emphasizing the viability of a clean and efficient economy will help expose the falsehood that there is no practical alternative to fossil fuels, a “fact” often assumed to be true due to the alternative’s lack of exposure.
 
The basic fact also remains that if we don’t significantly shift our economy towards efficiency and renewables, the factors causing the problems will only continue – that is, our huge appetite for energy and jobs in the absence of clean energy alternatives will ensure that burning fossil fuels will always have the popular support to continue until it triggers runaway global warming.
 
LASTLY, the climate movement must become broader-based, aiming to mobilize the mainstream public, not just progressives and environmental activists – that is, we must actively engage green businesses, unions, faith groups, scientists, farmers, First Nations, and a larger diversity of ethnic communities, among many others. Small groups of angry “activist superheroes” will not save the planet – only an informed, large-scale movement that represents a majority cross-section of society will have the power to fundamentally change it. This will naturally undermine the fossil fuel advocates’ PR claims that the movement consists primarily of “others” who are different from regular Canadians.
 
The current climate resurgence will be different than the previous surge in 2006. Movements naturally evolve, and hopefully in a way that allows them to make sufficient inroads to change the fundamental outcomes. In 2013, I believe that we’ll see the return of hope.

For Part 1 of this article, click here.

Image Credit: Ken Wu at McLaughlin Ridge by TJ Watts from Ancient Forest Alliance.

The Narwhal’s reporters are telling environment stories you won’t read about anywhere else. Stay in the loop by signing up for our free weekly dose of independent journalism.

Ken Wu is executive director of Majority for a Sustainable Society (MASS) and co-founder of the Ancient Forest Alliance. Read Part 2 of this series here.

After years of apathy and political inertia, North America’s climate sustainability movement has found itself in the midst of a timely resurgence, as is evident by the recent massive expansion of Bill Mckibben's 350.org movement against the Keystone XL pipeline.

With climate change regaining its footing as a central political issue, now is the time to pressure governments to enact the needed laws, policies, and agreements required to curtail runaway global warming. But unless the moment is seized right, climate action will be stymied again – and there is no time to wait for another opportunity.

During his State of the Union address on February 12, 2013, US President Barack Obama stated:

"For the sake of our children and our future, we must do more to combat climate change…We can choose to believe that Superstorm Sandy, and the most severe drought in decades, and the worst wildfires some states have ever seen were all just a freak coincidence. Or we can choose to believe in the overwhelming judgment of science – and act before it’s too late."
 
Recent studies project that the Earth’s average temperature is on course to rise over four degrees this century, far beyond the two degree rise when “runaway” global warming kicks-in due to positive feedbacks that make it extremely difficult to halt.

The question now is if the climate movement will grow strong enough, fast enough, to ensure sufficient government regulations, carbon pricing, policies, and international agreements to stop runaway global warming.

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The climate movement faces two likely obstacles when tackling global warming issues today: PR pushback from the fossil fuels industry and the movement’s own internal shortcomings. Addressing these issues simultaneously will require a broad-based response that coordinates political action, positive solutions and a smart economic emphasis.

Understanding the Obstacles
 
It’s important to recognize that the climate movement will have to face up to the influence of industry profit. Highly coordinated campaigns designed by Big Oil and their political backers are crafted to influence both public understanding of complex issues as well as policy creation.

Recent research, for example, has uncovered the efforts of the Koch brothers, US oil industry billionaires, to deny the scientific legitimacy of global warming, to dismantle regulatory bodies like the US Environmental Protection Agency, and to paralyze action on climate change at the international level.
 
In Canada, campaigns like Ethical Oil and the federal government’s depiction of environmentalists as ‘foreign funded’ ‘extremists’ both operate like the larger climate denial machine, which distracts and detracts from fact-based arguments by calling the credibility of environmental organizations, or individuals, into question.

But you’ll also hear a number of other arguments that seem to be becoming standard fare in climate denial or pro-fossil fuel talking points. You’ll hear, for example:

• that fossil fuels are indispensable for a flourishing economy flush with employment opportunities
• that alternative energy, while a worthy ideal, is just not viable
• that putting a price on pollution through mechanisms like a carbon tax would dismantle the economy
• that even the dirtiest fossil fuels in North America, like Alberta's tar sands, are more environmentally and morally superior than conventional oil from other nations with poorer human rights records
• that emerging technologies will make all fossil fuels clean and safe, including coal and bitumen

 

It's along this last point's line of thought, or wishful thinking, that you see the emergence of "clean coal" and "ethical oil," all of which rely more on rhetorical constructions than breakthrough technologies.

Room for Improvement

While the public relations campaigns launched by fossil fuel funds are undermining progress for climate sustainability, the environmental movement’s own entrenched tendencies might be partially to blame.

Some of these limiting tendencies are, for example:

• An underlying emphasis on voluntary, personal lifestyle reforms instead of the primacy of societal change through politics, laws, regulations and policies that reshape our economy, land-use, cities, and infrastructure.
• Being the movement of “no” or “stop”, that is, too much negative emphasis with proportionately less attention to solutions and alternatives.
• An insufficient focus on the economy, on how businesses can flourish and people can have jobs when destructive industries are restricted or phased-out.
• Aiming to mobilize the “same old, same old” minority, the 20% of strong progressives and environmentalists in society – or the minuscule fraction of activists among them.

 
Seeing the Way Forward

By surmounting its own limiting tendencies, the movement can counteract many of the fossil fuel industry's PR attacks and also move out of the margins, beyond the turf of mainly environmental idealists and activists, into a force that moves the much larger mainstream public with the power to change the status quo.

To read Ken's thoughts on how the climate movement might evolve to overcome these challenges, stay tuned for Part 2 of this article.

Image Credit: Ken Wu beside a fallen redcedar near Port Renfrew on Vancouver Island by TJ Watts from Ancient Forest Alliance.

The Narwhal’s reporters are telling environment stories you won’t read about anywhere else. Stay in the loop by signing up for our free weekly dose of independent journalism.