A wilderness conservation group is sounding the alarm over a major forestry company's bid to significantly increase the amount of timber it can cut in southern Alberta each year.

West Fraser Timber Co. Ltd. is seeking a significant increase to its annual allowable cut in the Crowsnest Forest Management Agreement area, according to a draft of its forest management plan posted on the company's website.

The current cut level, set by the province in 2017, is 157,800 cubic metres a year. West Fraser is proposing to raise that to 208,000 cubic metres annually under a new 10-year plan spanning 2025 to 2035. The plan has yet to be approved by the provincial government.

The plan dictates the scale, location and approach to logging in the region over the 10-year period. It covers an area from the Castle Parks, just south of Crowsnest Pass, north to the Kananaskis Country boundary, and includes the Porcupine Hills.

In 2021, Spray Lake Sawmills in Cochrane was awarded a 20-year agreement granting the company logging rights in the area. West Fraser, headquartered in Vancouver, acquired the family-owned forest products company in 2023.

'We really see this region as being vital,' says conservation group
The Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society's southern Alberta chapter says the proposed increase comes before comprehensive impact and watershed risk assessments have been completed, and will likely worsen existing environmental pressures in the area.

"We really see this region as being vital -- in terms of biodiversity, in terms of ecosystem function (and) in terms of watershed integrity," said Joshua Killeen, the organization's conservation science and programs manager. "If the plan goes ahead with the increase in allowable cut, then those impacts that we already see on the landscape would be further exacerbated."

Killeen noted much of the affected area is in the headwaters of southern Alberta's most important watersheds, which supply drinking and irrigation water across the province.

"What happens in those headwater regions has direct downstream impacts, across the prairies, the foothills and so on," he said. "Looking after those watersheds is really important."

He pointed to recent research linking clear-cutting to a rise in extreme floods and an increased risk of landslides -- research he says Alberta's forest management planning process fails to incorporate.

"In Alberta, we don't actually implement any of that science in our planning processes," he said. "We use a very simplistic and basic assessment in the forest management planning process, which doesn't effectively reflect the real risks that actually occur on the ground."

West Fraser disagreed with that notion, saying its plans are "informed by science to support forest health, clean water, wildlife habitats, recreation, and a range of social and environmental priorities."

"Each plan is developed based on current forest inventory data -- including the available land base, age of stands and growth rate. Plans are made available for public review and input prior to being reviewed and approved by government," the company said in a statement.

Group urges 'strongest possible protections' for biodiversity, watershed management
Killeen said another major concern is the effect of additional logging on biodiversity. He highlighted high-risk species such as the Westslope cutthroat trout -- listed as threatened under the provincial Wildlife Act -- as being "particularly vulnerable" to the effects of logging. About one-third of Alberta's remaining Westslope cutthroat trout habitat is within the plan area, the group says.

"If we have even more logging on the landscape, then that means that those impacts are likely to increase and those species are gonna continue to decrease in abundance," he said. "The more those impacts continue to increase, the bigger the risks and the impacts we see on biodiversity, on ecosystem function (and) on watersheds."

The group is calling for "the strongest possible protections" for biodiversity and watershed management in the area, and for the province to implement "modern, precautionary assessments and approaches to protect watersheds from the risks associated with clear-cutting."