Should piñon-juniper forests be converted to biofuels?

As Varlin Higbee looks out at the pinyon pine and juniper-covered forest that fills the high desert on the outskirts of this former Union Pacific Railroad town, there is only one thought that crosses his mind:

“They're just a wildfire waiting to happen,” the Lincoln County commissioner says of the short, bushy trees.

And Higbee isn't the only one who dislikes plants.

Despite the many uses that Native Americans once gave to piñon-juniper forests, one of which was piñon sustenance, ranchers and federal land managers throughout the southwestern United States now consider them a invasive and highly flammable scourge.

In parts of California and much of the Great Basin, landowners have declared war on pinyon pines and junipers, clearing them from grasslands with chains, bulldozers, saws and herbicides. At the same time, trees are attracting increasing interest as a renewable energy source, such as in Lassen County in California, where 150,000 tons of trees are fed each year to the Honey Lake Power Plant to generate power for customers such as San Diego Gas. and electric.

More recently, Higbee and other Nevada officials proposed converting them into green methanol, a biofuel that could be used for everything from generating electricity to powering cargo ships calling at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach.

In January, Nevada Governor Joe Lombardo signed a declaration of understanding with Denmark to develop an industrial park in Lincoln County where methanol would be extracted from wood and used as a fuel additive to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. diesel engine greenhouse.

According to Lombardo, it's a perfect combination.

“This innovative and collaborative technology project produces clean renewable energy while using trees that need to be cut down to maintain a healthy forest,” Lombardo said.

Environmental groups, however, have criticized the plan. Among other criticisms, they say the deal with Denmark sets the stage for a fight over the future of an ecologically rich landscape, much of which has been untouched by the glitz and bustle of Las Vegas and Reno.

Gary Hughes of Biofuelwatch, an advocacy group focused on the impact of bioenergy development, dismissed the proposal as “a technological dead end and a heartbreaking waste of healthy trees.”

A Maersk Line container ship from Denmark awaits unloading at the Port of Los Angeles. Denmark hopes the state of Nevada will convert stone pines and junipers into biofuels that could be used to power cargo ships.

(Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times)

Denmark, home to Maersk, the world's largest container shipping company, has committed to being 100% fossil fuel-free by 2050, and bioenergy is a key part of that ambitious effort.

“Denmark is at the forefront of renewable energy development and closer collaboration between Nevada and Denmark can only strengthen our joint quest to create economic growth and good-paying jobs, while benefiting the environment and our planet,” it reads. in a Danish statement. Ambassador to the United States Jesper Møller Sørensen.

Nevada officials want to locate the facility amid about 1.3 million acres of piñon-juniper forests on public lands about 150 miles northeast of Las Vegas. The proposed site is also traversed by a Union Pacific mainline that terminates at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach.

The facility, officials say, could attract $260 million in investment, create 150 much-needed local jobs and become a model for the creation of similar industrial parks elsewhere in Nevada.

But there are significant environmental issues involved in harvesting 15- to 20-foot-tall old-growth trees on the mountainous public lands of eastern Nevada.

“I would be surprised if this proposal were successful,” Hughes said. “So far, all efforts to produce methanol from wood on a scale for the aviation industry, for example, have failed.”

Patrick Donnelly, director of the Great Basin Center for Biological Diversity, called it a new chapter in “our nation's 200-year war on piñon-juniper ecosystems.”

“Each generation finds a new excuse to justify their destruction because they do not provide the economic benefits obtained from the tall pine trees favored by the logging industry,” he said.

“Now, it seems like the state of Nevada is popping the champagne cork because it thinks it has found a way to make money from trees,” Donnelly said. “But I see it as a short-term carbon benefit at the expense of the long-term carbon sequestration benefits that a healthy forest provides.”

The development of renewable energy facilities (solar, wind, geothermal and biomass) on public lands has been a top priority of the federal government as it seeks to alleviate the country's dependence on fossil fuels and curb global warming.

With that goal in mind, the Bureau of Land Management is working closely in Lincoln County with the governor's office of economic development, engineers in Denmark and Sixco Nevada Inc. (a consortium of companies focused on deploying new technologies). to develop the proposal.

In the eyes of the BLM, pinyon pines and junipers are weed species that encroach on sagebrush grasslands and increase the risk of wildfires. They say an overabundance of piñon-juniper forests fueled the 2022 Calf Canyon-Hermits Peak Fire in New Mexico, which burned 341,735 acres, a state record.

But environmentalists argue that the loss of trees outweighs the benefits of biofuel and biomass production.

Piñon-juniper forests absorb atmospheric carbon through the process of photosynthesis and have been widespread for thousands of years across much of Nevada and Utah, as well as parts of California, Idaho, Oregon, Wyoming, and Baja California. Critics of the biofuels project say the role of forests in storing carbon is critical to fighting climate change.

Environmentalists are also concerned that the loss and degradation of pinyon-juniper forests poses a significant threat to several animal species, including the brilliant blue pinyon jay, which is being considered for federal listing as an endangered species. .

Lincoln County Commissioner Varlin Higbee, center, walks with Derick Hembd, right, president of Sixco Nevada, a consortium of companies focused on infrastructure, and Bill Vinnicombet, energy financial advisor for Sixco Nevada, in the proposed site for tree harvesting and biofuel production. project northeast of Las Vegas.

(Louis Sahagún / Los Angeles Times)

The Western Watershed Project and the Center for Biological Diversity have filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court challenging the BLM's approval of a plan to remove piñon-juniper forests on more than 380,000 acres of brushwood. sagebrush on federal lands in eastern Nevada.

The lawsuit claims the plan would eradicate habitat for endangered sage-grouse and stone jays with techniques including “chaining” — dragging an anchor chain from a U.S. Navy ship between two excavators to uproot and crush forests of pinyon, juniper and sagebrush.

Derick Hembd, president of Sixco Nevada, said the governor's proposal calls for using scissors and saws to cut down individual trees, leaving young trees and sagebrush intact.

It remains to be seen, however, whether concerns about the future of pinyon jays and other creatures threaten to halt or derail the project in rural Lincoln County, best known as the gateway to the secretive Force Area 51 military installation. US Air

But Higbee, 63, has high hopes for the proposal, which could also breathe new life into struggling rural communities like Caliente, where the population of about 1,100 hasn't moved in decades.

“We need to grow,” Higbee said with frustration. “I'm going to do everything in my power to get this project off the ground.”