Project Benefits

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Restored forest health. Facility operations will support thinning of 5 – 6 forested acres per day or approximately 1,500 acres annually. This will help build a healthy forest ecosystem, strengthen community resilience, protect critical infrastructure, and promote sustainable timber harvesting practices in the region.

Job creation. 10 full-time, year-round, permanent jobs will be created for facility operations plus at least 15 additional indirect jobs for construction, forestry activities and log/wood product transportation. Alpenglow Timber will also build on-site employee housing that will help to overcome some of the region’s housing inequalities due to skyrocketing housing costs, second-home ownership and short-term rentals. 

Local economic boost. Based on the Sierra Business Council’s benefits analysis using the Jobs EQ Input Output model, Alpenglow Timber’s total annual economic impact is $5.4 million with a “ripple effect” in the adjacent forest-sector of $712,000 per year. The analysis also documents the potential cost avoided from the project is over $25 million per year based on an extrapolation from a 2013 study of the 15,000-acre Schultz wildfire in Flagstaff, Arizona. That study showed how high the true cost is of wildfires affecting towns and impacting the surrounding forests.
Carbon benefits. Removal of small diameter trees to support facility operations will accelerate the development of larger residual trees that more effectively sequester carbon when compared to surface and ladder fuels. Alpenglow Timber’s manufactured wood products, especially the production of mass timber components, will also store a significant amount of carbon for an indefinite length of time and replace more carbon intensive building materials like steel and concrete. 

Clean air. The facility will utilize sawmill residuals to generate thermal energy for kiln drying wood products and heating on-site buildings, eliminating reliance on fossil fuels and achieving a net reduction of green-house gas emissions by at least 1,714 metric tons of CO2 per year. Tree thinning will reduce the risk of health impacts associated with smoke from uncontrolled forest fires.

Sustainable recreation and tourism. Alpenglow Timber and its affiliated vegetation management company work with several conservation groups who support continued recreation opportunities, among them the Truckee Donner Land Trust, Truckee Tahoe Community Foundation, and the National Forest Foundation.

Alignment with State goals. This project advances the goals of the California Wildfire and Forest Resilience Action Plan, as well as the State’s Memorandum of Understanding with the US Forest Service for Shared Stewardship of California’s Forests. Thinning of small diameter trees to supply the facility will enable land managers to reintroduce beneficial fire as a land management tool. Harvested trees will be manufactured into solid wood products and sold by Alpenglow Timber, offsetting forest management costs and contributing to a self-supporting forest stewardship economy. The project also wholly aligns with the state’s goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by reducing vehicle miles traveled , particularly for heavy trucks, and in utilizing renewable energy.

Consistent with county planning principles. The entirety of the larger Klondike Flats area is classified by the County of Nevada as a ‘Rural District’ with a more-specific individual zoning of “Forest” applicable to the project site, the Klondike Flats residential area and the larger surrounding USFS-owned lands. This Forest zoning is intended to “provide areas for the protection, production and management of timber and timber support uses,” allowing for uses such as lumber mills, woodyards, timber harvesting and other agricultural-based uses. Similarly, the county has designated this area to be a “Rural Region” with a “Forest” land-use designation within their General Plan. Beyond project consistency with this General Plan land use designation, the project is consistent with all goals and policies of the General Plan, including those relating to land use, noise, air quality and safety. The entire Klondike Flat area including the proposed sawmill site is zoned and designated specifically for the protection, production and management of timber and timber support uses. 

Replicable model. Alpenglow Timber’s fully integrated wood utilization approach provides a model for others in the Sierra Nevada to reproduce, making the highest use of low value, small diameter logs and increasing the pace and scale of forest restoration.  

Permit. Alpenglow Timber has submitted its Use Permit application and CEQA documentation to Nevada County. Both the project application and completed county CEQA documents are available for public review and can be viewed at: https://www.nevadacountyca.gov/994/Environmental-Documents.