2017 Enviva Forest Conservation Fund Request for Pre-Proposals
For Immediate Release:
Greenville, S.C. and Bethesda, Md., November 1 – The U.S. Endowment for Forestry and Communities (Endowment) today released a new Request for Proposals for the Enviva Forest Conservation Fund. Up to $500,000 is available for 2017 grants to protect bottomland hardwood and other wetland forests in northeast North Carolina and southeast Virginia.
This is the second year of a $5 million, 10-year program launched by Enviva Holdings, LP (Enviva) and the Endowment in 2015. Not-for-profit organizations, government agencies and tribes are eligible to apply for grants. The deadline for proposals is March 1, 2017. The RFP and additional materials are available on the Endowment’s website and at https://envivaforestfund.orgmatching-fund-grants/.
“Given the success of the inaugural year of the Enviva Forest Conservation Fund, we are very excited to invite applications for the 2017 program,” said Carlton Owen, the Endowment President and CEO. “The four grants awarded in 2016 were critically important to help protect more than 2,000 acres of sensitive, bottomland and wetland forests. Well-managed, working forests also are being protected from conversion to non-forest uses.”
“We were very pleased to work with our friends at The Nature Conservancy, Triangle Land Conservancy and the Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation, who joined with the Enviva Forest Conservation Fund to preserve thousands of acres of high conservation value forestland,” said Dr. Jennifer Jenkins, Vice President and Chief Sustainability Officer at Enviva. “Enviva has always believed there are special places in the forest that should remain so. The 2016 grants from the Enviva Forest Conservation Fund enabled leading environmental organizations to protect those special places through forest stewardship, conservation, preservation and the promotion of sustainable harvesting.”
The Enviva Forest Conservation Fund expands Enviva’s commitment to protecting the region’s forests and strengthens its policy of not accepting wood from environmentally sensitive areas. Enviva also has created a Blue Ribbon Panel led by the Endowment that will recommend specific measures to define and protect sensitive areas. And the company has pledged not to take wood from High Conservation Value areas in four especially sensitive habitat types: cypress-tupelo swamps, Atlantic white cedar stands, pocosins and Carolina bays.
“These forests help clean our drinking water, buffer structures from storms, and provide habitat for many species of wildlife, while at the same time providing jobs and economic opportunity for rural families and private landowners,” Owen said. “The Enviva Forest Conservation Fund will permanently protect some of the most sensitive bottomland forests in Virginia and North Carolina and will improve the sustainable management of others. We are pleased to be working with Enviva to advance these important goals and look forward to receiving applications for the 2017 grant year.”
# # #
For more information contact:
Alicia Cramer, 205-792-8650, alicia@usendowment.org
The U.S. Endowment for Forestry and Communities (the Endowment) is a not-for-profit public charity working collaboratively with partners in the public and private sectors to advance systemic, transformative, and sustainable change for the health and vitality of the nation’s working forests and forest-reliant communities – www.usendowment.org
About Enviva
Enviva is the world’s largest producer of wood pellets, a renewable energy source used to generate electricity and heat. We produce our pellets at plants in the Southern U.S. and supply them to electric power plants in the United Kingdom and continental Europe that previously were fueled by coal, enabling them to reduce their lifetime carbon emissions by about 80 percent. We make our pellets using sustainable practices that protect Southern forests. And we employ more than 600 people and support many other businesses in the rural South.
Enviva conducts its activities primarily through two entities: Enviva Partners, LP, a publicly-traded master limited partnership (NYSE: EVA), and Enviva Development Holdings, LLC, a wholly-owned private company. To learn more about Enviva, please visit our website, www.envivabiomass.com.
