States Set Clean Energy Goals

This edition of Green Gazette includes updates on how individual states are achieving clean energy, the future of shelterbelts in rural America, networks for Black community food security, and more.

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by Getty Images/Leonid Eremeychuk

Shelterbelt Eviction

In the mid-1930s, President Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered the U. S. Forest Service to plant millions of tall trees throughout the Midwest, from the Dakotas down to Texas, in an effort to curb the topsoil erosion that contributed to the Dust Bowl’s drought and destruction. But, as reported by Carson Vaughan for Food & Environment Reporting Network in 2017, those rows of trees, which at the time formed 18,000 miles of windbreaks on 33,000 farms, are now at risk as farmers remove them in favor of expanding their arable land.

According to Vaughan, economic pressure has caused many Plains farmers to uproot the trees, as the immediate payoff outweighs conservation concerns. Plus, farmers now use an array of tactics to prevent erosion, including no-till farming and cover cropping. But this ongoing shelterbelt conversion may remove critical protection that’s needed in the face of modern-day climate change risks, such as prolonged drought and aquifer depletion.

Beyond controlling erosion, shelterbelts can also buffer cold winter winds, retain moisture, produce fuel in the form of firewood, provide shade, and increase biodiversity. Farmers who want to go against the grain and plant or restore shelterbelts can contact their local extension offices or forest services to receive assistance with choosing species, design, density, and orientation.

Read more about the shelterbelt shift by searching for “Great Wall of Trees” on the Food & Environment Reporting Network website.

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