Dr. Elaine Oneil, executive director of the Washington Farm Forestry Association, will give a presentation titled “Climate, Carbon and Our Forests” at 7 p.m. Tuesday, March 19, at the Veterans Memorial Museum in Chehalis.
The event is sponsored by the Lewis County Farm Forestry Association and is open to the public at no charge.
Oneil, a specialist in climate change, carbon accounting and forest health, will explore the history and future of one of the state’s best kept secrets — its forests and their remarkable carbon cycling technology, according to a news release.
“We are a part of a global system of weather, of climate, of commerce, of human need for forests and their products,” organizers wrote in the release. “We are also a part of a local system of economy and ecology where human needs for forest products and the forest’s need for human ingenuity are reflected in our focus on forest health, sustainability and innovation. There are many reasons for optimism and few reasons for despair. Our forests are remarkable, resilient and fully capable of providing for human needs at all scales, and in all ways. When we remember that people are also a part of this system, and not apart from it, durable solutions will emerge — for the climate, the community and the forests.”
Oneil has spent nearly 40 years in the forest sector, including operational forestry and management, conducting research on climate change, timber supply modeling and analysis, forest carbon dynamics, life cycle assessment of forest operations and wood products, the release states.
Oneil now dedicates a significant amount of her time to integrating these elements within a policy and economic framework that works for small forest landowners.
Since 2013, Oneil has served as the executive director of the Washington Farm Forestry Association.
Since 2017, she has also served as the director of science and sustainability for the Consortium for Research on Renewable Industrial Materials, a university research consortium that has spent 26 years conducting life cycle inventory and assessments on wood products. She is a small-forest landowner, author, educator and regularly testifies as an expert witness on carbon, climate change and forest operations.
