URBAN WOOD RESCUE

Urban Wood Rescue  (UWR) is a program of the non-profit Sacramento Tree Foundation. For almost four decades, the Tree Foundation has been dedicated to creating and sustaining a healthy urban forest in Sacramento through tree planting, education, and community programs. We began to see that at their end of life, trees were being sent to the landfill. Not only did this end seem to diminish the value and beauty these trees had given to the urban landscape, but it also meant that as they decomposed, the carbon sequestration they so beautifully provided was reversed.

Urban wood utilization is a critical component of full-cycle urban forest management and addresses important ecological issues. Namely, UWR reduces landfill waste, achieves greenhouse gas reduction benefits through carbon sequestration, and provides needed green materials for sustainable building, furniture, and other uses.

When it comes to diverting logs from the waste stream and capturing carbon, to date the UWR program has:
• Diverted 1271 logs
• Milled 317,000 board feet of lumber
• Captured 6700 metric tons of carbon

Funding for this project provided by the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection as part of the California Climate Investment Program.