Trump Lifts Protections for Tongass National Forest, Allowing Logging, Road Development
Alaska’s Tongass National Forest was protected from logging and other development for nearly two decades.
By Yasemin Saplakoglu | Live Science Staff Writer

OCTOBER 28, 2020 | President Donald Trump will strip Alaska’s Tongass National Forest from protections put in place nearly two decades ago, opening up millions of acres of pristine wilderness to road development and logging, according to a notice from the U.S. Department of Agriculture posted on Wednesday (Oct. 28).

A young brown bear fishing for salmon in the Tongass National Forest’s Freshwater Bay creek.
(Image: © Danita Delimont via Getty Images)

The Tongass, which covers most of southeast Alaska, is one of the world’s largest remaining temperate rainforests and serves as a major carbon sink, absorbing at least 9% of all the carbon stored in all of the continental U.S. forests combined, according to The Washington Post.

(Lauren Tierney)

“While tropical rainforests are the lungs of the planet, the Tongass is the lungs of North America,” Dominick DellaSala, chief scientist with the Earth Island Institute’s Wild Heritage project told The Post. “It’s America’s last climate sanctuary.” It’s also home to many ancient trees and magnificent wildlife, from brown bears to wild salmon.

Much of the Tongass was protected from logging and road construction by the 2001 Roadless Rule, which was put in place by former President Bill Clinton. But starting tomorrow (Oct. 29), the Tongass National Forest will be exempt from this rule, meaning that logging companies can legally build roads and cut timber throughout the forest.