Southern Company - Corporate Responsibility Report: Ecosystems

Collaborative Partnerships: Ecosystems

Recreating a longleaf pine-wiregrass ecosystem requires fire, usually through prescribed burns, to create open savanna. During their first few years of growth, longleaf pines do not look like trees, but grass, until fire sparks their growth.

Longleaf Legacy

The Longleaf Legacy Program helps restore the South's stately longleaf pine ecosystem, with the added benefit of capturing and storing atmospheric carbon dioxide. The program operates through a partnership between Southern Company—including its four operating companies—and the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation.

Longleaf pine forests once carpeted 95 million acres of the southern United States. Today, less than 3 percent remains. Longleaf forests provide important habitat for bobwhite quails, red-cockaded woodpeckers, wild turkeys, gopher tortoises, and a host of other plants and animals found nowhere else on Earth. Longleaf ecosystems contain a stunning diversity of plants—nearly 600 species, half of which are considered rare. Restoration of the ecosystem is a top priority for government agencies, conservation groups, and the public. Millions of people enjoy hunting, fishing, birding, and hiking in longleaf forests.

The Longleaf Legacy program was launched in 2004 and is the largest public agency-private corporation conservation funding effort for this ecosystem. Southern Company and NFWF each contribute $500,000 annually to this 10-year partnership. The combined $1 million is then made available through a competitive grant program for projects within the Southern Company service territory. Grantees are required to match all awards. In addition, Southern Company provides $100,000 annually to support the NFWF's own longleaf conservation efforts.

Longleaf Stewardship Fund

Building on nearly a decade of investment to restore vanishing longleaf pine forests in the southeastern United States, NFWF (the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation) has established the Longleaf Stewardship Fund, a landmark public-private partnership that includes the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD), the USDA Forest Service (FS), the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS), the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) and Southern Company. With the combined financial and technical resources of the group, the Fund will support accelerated restoration of the longleaf pine ecosystem and implementation of the Range-Wide Conservation Plan for Longleaf Pine, while advancing the mission objectives of each of the partners.

Press Release | Press Video | Longleaf Stewardship Fund | More about NFWF | How to apply

Funding Priorities

The goal of the Longleaf Legacy program is to advance the restoration and protection of the historic Longleaf Pine Range to achieve viable ecosystems on public and private lands. Grants are awarded to support this goal and the following objectives:

Accomplish on-the-ground restoration projects, particularly reforestation, that will result in measurable improvements to forest health, wildlife habitat, and targeted species populations
Advance implementation of the Open Pine Decision Support Tool (View Map - note: GA priorities to be added soon), National Bobwhite Conservation Initiative (View Map) and the America's Longleaf (View Map)
Provide demonstration-scale restoration projects that can be used to showcase restoration methods and techniques to other practitioners and landowners
Ensure restoration and protection projects are maintained and managed in a sustainable fashion
Engage the public in on-the-ground restoration and protection activities that promote awareness of the significance of the Longleaf Pine Ecosystem

The following activities are priorities of the Longleaf Legacy program:

Reforesting existing or historic longleaf pine ecosystems, including converting loblolly or other non-native stands to longleaf
Restoring the understory using proven restoration techniques such as planting native species, thinning, invasives control, and prescribed burns
Expanding on-the-ground restoration and protection activities on private lands by increasing technical assistance to private landowners in coordination with local NRCS field offices and other partners

Accomplishments

Awarded 48 grants to 18 different conservation organizations and agencies
Awarded nearly $4.6 million; with matching funds, total on-the-ground impact of more than $59.6 million
More than 83,000 acres directly replanted with more than 42 million seedlings*

* Figures are approximate. Includes completed and anticipate results, estimated for funded projects estimated for funded projects cumulatively through 2012.

Grant Recipients: 2011 | 2010 | 2009 | 2008 | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004

Restoring Longleaf Pines

To support conservation and restoration of 8,430 acres of longleaf habitat, the Georgia DNR, in partnership with Longleaf Legacy, will plant more than 2 million trees in southwestern Georgia. The project will benefit species dependent on the longleaf ecosystem, like the gopher tortoise, as well as forested wetland habitats. The property will be protected in perpetuity as a State Heritage Preserve and managed as a Wildlife Management Area.

Official Georgia DNR Silver Lake Page