North America has a very large expanse of both Boreal and Temperate forests. The Boreal forests extend across two continents along the subarctic latitudes and occupy about 14.5 percent of Earth's land surface, but contain over 30% of all carbon contained in the terrestrial biome. These forests cover an area estimated 6.4 million square miles (16.6 million square kilometers) or almost twice the size of the United States. With the increase in pine beetle kill and extreme fires, there is a great deal of reforestation, application of new forest management techniques and preservation to be accomplished in North America.
ERA began in 2005 with the Community Ecosystem Restoration Program (CERP). We created a win-win situation with local municipalities as we restored local riparian areas that were logged half a century or more ago and were never effectively restored. ERA undertook all of the clearing, planting and maintenance work at no cost to the municipalities and in return had the rights to sell the resulting carbon offsets to the voluntary market for companies that wanted to offset their footprint within the context of their sustainability and corporate social responsibility policies.