Given the number of complaints of a slow response from the B.C. Ministry of Forests to green lighting permitting of salvage operations in burn areas—at a time when some sawmills are facing significant fibre shortages—the province has announced new measures to streamline and accelerate timber salvage permitting.

The goal is to make it easier for the forestry sector to recover and repurpose damaged wood and regenerate the forests.

In 2023, a staggering total of 2.84 million hectares burned in B.C., which is more than double the previous record set in 2018 of 1.35 million hectares. And according to government figures, the number of hectares being impacted by wildfires in the province is increasing exponentially each year.

That represents a lot of burned timber, some of which could be salvaged.

According to industry experts, salvageable timber must be harvested within about a year of a forest fire for the wood fibre to retain its highest value. The complaint was that neighbouring Alberta was permitting salvage operations in about 60 days whereas it was taking up to a year or more for approvals to be granted by the B.C. Ministry of Forests.

The B.C. government is aiming to improve on that, recognizing that a significant amount of potentially merchantable fire-damaged timber has in the past been left to decay in the forest due to the government’s slow permitting response.

“During my visits in forestry communities throughout the province, speeding up salvage is something I’ve been hearing a lot from people,” says Andrew Mercier, B.C.’s Minister of State for Sustainable Forestry Innovation. “Making the salvage of fire-damaged wood faster, easier and more economic means more forestry operations can access fire-damaged wood, supporting forestry-dependent regions and forestry workers.”

In February, the Ministry of Forests updated its forest cover inventory maps to reflect 2023 fire perimeters. The goal is to enable more accurate and faster salvage planning.

One thing is certain about the willingness of B.C. forest companies to process fire damaged versus green timber: there will likely be very little resistance. There are a lot of areas in the province where the timber supply has gone down so much that any wood is valuable wood right now.

According to the B.C. government, initial estimates show 12 to 15 per cent of wildfire-damaged areas from 2023 wildfires are available to salvage when considering such issues as accessibility, damage, burn severity, retention areas and cultural values.

Secondly, the province is making adjustments to its stumpage fees, “making it more economic for businesses to salvage damaged wood”, it says.

That is reflected in changes made to the Interior Appraisal Manual in April that the government says increases flexibility, and has established pricing policy for forestry operations and First Nations that want to salvage wildfire-damaged timber in B.C. The updated pricing guidelines, it says, better reflect the price of wildfire-damaged wood in the government’s stumpage fees and in the associated costs of salvage logging.

Recognizing that more and more intense wildfires could become an issue every year given climate change, B.C. has also established a wildfire salvage leadership committee which it says brings together specialists from across government, the forestry sector and the First Nations Forestry Council. The committee has already developed key recommendations and set targets to improve the salvage of wildfire-damaged timber.

As a result of their recommendations, a wildfire salvage guidebook is under development.

Some salvage logging was already approved prior to the changes made to the Interior Appraisal Manual. The Ministry of Forests says that salvage cutting permits had already been issued for almost 1.4 million cubic metres of volume, equating to about 28,000 logging truck loads of wildfire-damaged wood recovered.

A cross section of industry, labour and forestry groups have responded favorably to these changes and an expert in forests and fires—particularly in B.C. and Alberta —says that change in how quickly B.C. grants permits for burnt timber salvage logging was definitely needed.

Bruce Blackwell, owner of B.A. Blackwell and Associates, headquartered in North Vancouver, is a registered professional forester and biologist with 35 years of experience providing a variety of forest management services to companies in B.C. and Alberta. The company has considerable experience in advising on fibre management in areas impacted by the mountain pine beetle. He has a Masters degree in Wildfire Science, has advised government on policy, fire management and mitigation, and prescribed fire, and has worked as an expert witness in wildfire related litigation.

“There seems to be a trend where we are seeing larger and larger areas being affected by wildfire,” says Blackwell.

Given climate change, it was predicted back in the early 2000’s that fires would become more severe and impact a larger area, and if the past year is any indication, that prediction has come true. The 2023 fire season wasn’t just a one-off as a consequence of the El Nino weather pattern. The amount of area being burned in B.C. has been trending upwards for some time.

But to capture the highest value of available salvage timber, it bears repeating that time is of the essence. Blackwell says that fire damaged wood from this summer should be harvested by the following winter.

“We have a very short window to maximize the value,” he says. “From how I understand it, you lose about 50 per cent of the wood fibre’s value if you can’t log it in that first winter. To get it logged in that first winter requires that we have an expedited permitting process.”

Until the recent announcement by the B.C. Ministry of Forests, he says that wasn’t happening. One of the issues that the government will have to address going forward—because fires tend to be concentrated regionally—is whether it has the employee capacity working in those burned areas to meet its expedited salvage permitting objective, while still addressing such issues as maintaining biodiversity and considering other hazards like landslides, erosion and debris flows.

Assessment of which areas are available for salvage logging is necessary because there are biodiversity and hazard related issues, Blackwell says. Some wood should be left standing because it is ecologically important and valued. That takes time—but these are not normal times. Never before has B.C. experienced this amount of geographic area impacted by wildfire, with so much salvageable merchantable timber available.

One thing is certain from Blackwell’s perspective about the willingness of forest companies to process fire damaged versus green timber: there will likely be very little resistance.

“There are a lot of areas where the timber supply has gone down so much because of the mountain pine beetle that any wood is valuable wood right now,” he says. “The annual harvest has gone from about 54 million cubic metres (annually in the Province of B.C.) down to about 32 million. So adding a couple million cubic metres to that 32 million figure is a significant uplift.”

Quicker harvesting of salvageable burnt timber will be a boon to industry to help maintain the viability of some sawmills, and continue to provide jobs in some forest-dependent communities. It will also facilitate more timely and prompt reforestation that will reduce the Crown’s future reforestation liabilities. However, Blackwell says it won’t be anything like the ‘gold rush’ that occurred when salvage operations were at their peak during the height of the beetle infestation.

In that case, the amount of salvageable wood was so plentiful at times and with the clock ticking that some companies set up extra capacity like temporary sawmills to process all of the suddenly available merchantable timber. The difference in salvaging merchantable burnt timber and what occurred during the beetle epidemic was that the merchantability of the beetle-infected wood lasted much longer than expected, says Blackwell. That won’t be the case with the burnt timber.

There are significant benefits from salvage operations simply from a forest management perspective, given lessons learned from the beetle infestation.

“The one thing that we have learned (from the beetle salvage process) is where we don’t salvage for beetle, those dead stands go to the ground, young trees grow up into that dead wood, and they actually become a significant fire hazard,” he says. “And those fires are some of the worst fires we have seen in the past 20 years—those impacted beetle stands.”