Editorial: Personally making a difference

Monday, July 30, 2007 | 7:05 a.m.

Tornados, wildfires, boring and bark-eating insects, droughts, floods and human activities are a constant threat to the nation's 155 national forests. In guarding against these and other dangers, the U.S. Forest Service has always been able to count on support from conservation organizations.

Now, owing to the connectivity of the Internet, individuals have a chance to get involved - and to learn about their carbon footprint while they are at it.

The Carbon Capital Fund was announced last week by the Forest Service and its congressionally charted nonprofit partner, the National Forest Foundation. For those who do not know their carbon footprint, the Web sites www.carboncapitalfund.org and www.natlforests.org have handy calculators.

Individuals - and there's nothing stopping groups from participating - can use the calculator to determine the amount of carbon dioxide that their daily activities cause to be released into the atmosphere through the burning of fossil fuels.

Once their carbon footprints are known, contributions can be made to offset them. The money raised (to be monitored by a third party to ensure against waste or fraud) will be used exclusively to restore damaged forests, mainly through the planting of tens of thousands of trees. Trees absorb carbon dioxide and give off oxygen, a natural phenomenon that makes forests essential to the control of greenhouse gases.

The Forest Service estimates that our national forests offset about 10 percent of the carbon emissions in the United States. It also estimates that amount could rise to 25 percent through increased tree plantings, especially in forests that have been ravaged either by man or nature.

Examples of where the contributions could be used include the Custer National Forest straddling Montana and North Dakota, where a 2002 fire charred 65,000 acres. Also, a tornado last year in the Payette National Forest in Idaho heavily damaged more than 4,000 acres.

In addition to offsetting carbon emissions, reforestation projects improve water quality and wildlife habitat.

We believe this program could become an important part of the solution to air pollution and global warming. We hope, though, participants see it for what it is - a chance to personally make a difference in our environment, and not as a way to clear their conscience about leaving ever-bigger carbon footprints.