Forest Carbon Offset Project Update - March 29, 2022
Nathan Lojewski, Chugachmiut Forestry Manager
Sandy Letzing, PNW Regional Forester, FCW
We have been working for several years to develop a forest carbon offset project on the Native Allotment in the Chugach Region. We have been trying to create a project for the California Compliance markets similar to projects developed by Native corporations like Chugach Alaska Corporation, Port Graham Corporation, and English Bay corporation.
Unfortunately, these projects have required involvement from the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and they have not been willing to work with us on this project, and the project has been on hold for many years.
Recent developments in forest inventory technology and new voluntary forest carbon offset markets have led to a unique opportunity for carbon offsets on the Native Allotments.
Chugachmiut Forestry is actively working on investigating these opportunities, and we have found a potential partner to develop a project. I want to Introduce Sandy Letzing, A Forester with Forest Carbon Works. Forest Carbon Works has developed a method for small individual landowners to sign up for carbon projects and receive income from the sales of carbon offsets generated from their land.
My name is Sandy, and I am the Northwest Forester at Forest Carbon Works.
We help develop and manage forest carbons offset projects on private properties. We develop projects to generate carbon credits from a landowner’s property, which would pay the landowner. These payments are made in ($) per acre per year payments. The Chugachmiut Native allotments have a great potential to benefit from this opportunity, as this is revenue from simply letting the forest grow while also providing the co-benefit of protecting the legacy of the land and its ecological value for generations to come. It also remains compatible with harvesting wood for firewood, building, or crafting.
We will be reaching out to Allotment owners over the next few months to gauge their interest in a carbon offset project. At this time, we do not have estimated payments to landowners. If there is enough interest for a project, we would like to hire local forest inventory staff based in Port Graham and Nanwalek to measure carbon stored in trees on individual Native allotments. This data would assist us in providing estimated payments to landowners and deciding whether to develop or not to develop a forest offset project.
If you have questions, please feel free to reach out to Nathan at 907-562-4155 or Nathan@Chugachmiut.org or check out Forest Carbon Works website https://forestcarbonworks.org/
