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Comment by mitjam | Hacker News Reader

These could be on the order of 300k trees, illegally cutting a tree in Germany could cost up to 50k euro, that sums up to 15B Euro. Bad math but it gives a perspective on the magnitude of not caring about the natural environment.

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So like a days revenue for Google at an incalculable loss for the environment and living things ?

True, again,

I'm of course against illegal logging, but in this case there was very little loss of the environment. These planted pine forests in the Nordics are not biodiversity hubs in any stretch of imagination. They do support life, but not much. You will generally not meet any animal there, except some birds perhaps if you're lucky. It would be another matter altogether if this was an old growth forest. This one is more like just a procedural blunder.

> While Google argued the land was standard commercial forest harvested under the Forestry Act, local environmental groups—including the Finnish Association for Nature Conservation (Suomen luonnonsuojeluliitto)—protested, claiming that indiscriminate logging had encroached upon native habitats and high-value nature sites that should have been preserved.

Also, even much of the planted forests were practicing GTR (Green Tree Retention) techniques which have been spreading in usage across Finland. It's a technique to increase native biodiversity. It is incorrect to state that these planted forests are purely for commercial purposes

And a lot of the non-native forests were explicitly government-protected rare native habitats.

We're talking about 815 acres at Muhos and another 494 acres at Kajaani. Call me cynical but it seems clear that making sure to get rid of the high value native forests and say "woops, sorry" was the strategy. If they'd left them, it would imperil the entire construction project. Now activists have the onus on them to prove how much was native vs planted from unreliable old datasets and imagery.

    > incalculable loss

This is silly. This land was an industrial monoculture wood crop, not a forest.

I said incalculable loss because the DC will replace something that helped cool the planet with something that will heat it. I wasn't talking about bio diversity, I'm talking about the boot in the face during climate crisis.

Did you feel the same when Tesla cut down trees in Brandenburg to build a Gigafactory? And, all buildings -- residences or commercial -- cause a negative impact on the planet because they have a positive carbon footprint. Really, what is being said here? Not much.

Yes because there is enough pre-developed land that could be used for such projects.

Tesla: https://anonymous94538.substack.com/p/tesla-fremont-is-apply...

You're not saying much...

You should say incalculable loss because Google cut down actual native forests that were legally protected. These forests are very rare and very biodiverse.

GP is spreading misinformation. Data center companies seem to have bot armies on HN nowadays

This is absolutely untrue and an overstatement of even Google's position in court. Google claims it was "mostly" planted. It's undeniable that tons of very rare native forests were cut down alongside this (we're talking about 815 acres in Muhos and 494 acres in Kajaani). Google very clearly intended to destroy them as quickly as possible to leave activists relying on old documents and unreliable datasets to make their claims. If they'd left those native forests it would have threatened the whole construction project.

Also much of those planted forests were GTR zones. These are planted forests that use GTR techniques to increase and protect native biodiversity.

It's also incorrect to say they were monocultures since they were mixes of native tree species.

    > It's undeniable that tons of very rare native forests were cut down alongside this (we're talking about 815 acres in Muhos and 494 acres in Kajaani).  Google very clearly intended to destroy them as quickly as possible to leave activists relying on old documents and unreliable datasets to make their claims. If they'd left those native forests it would have threatened the whole construction project.

What is your source?

Also, what is the meaning of "GTR" in Finnish or English? Google tells me nothing.

Green Tree Retention. It specifically means the practice leaving certain trees in these planted forests but its evolved to encompass much more research and practices.

This whole debate is happening because Google rushed to clear the sites before the EIA was completed which was meant to identify the sites of dense native forests. Google claims it did its own internal reviews and preserved a few crucial sites, but the Finnish Association for Nature Conservation, aka Suomen luonnonsuojeluliitto, (which is the group that got work stopped) used satellite imagery to prove there were multiple dense native forest sites that also got cut down

Google's entire bet here is that it could turn this into a "procedural issue" of "woops, we didn't quite finish the EIA before we started. oh well, we'll just pay the fine" because they clearly knew there was plenty of protected dense native forest patches. They wanted to remove all the evidence of them as quickly as possible

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