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"Our Dying Forests" a Salt Lake Tribune investigation into what's causing massive red and gray swaths of dead trees throughout the Intermountain West, has won a prestigious and lucrative national environmental reporting prize.
Reporter Brandon Loomis, along with photographer Rick Egan and editor David Noyce, on Tuesday accepted the 2012 Grantham Prize for Excellence in Reporting on the Environment — along with $75,000 — at a ceremony in Washington, D.C.
Loomis and Egan in 2011 traveled a five-state region to learn why a natural, cyclical outbreak of bark beetles has exploded beyond anything witnessed in recorded history.
Loomis talked to researchers exploring and defining the problem, land managers struggling and often failing to keep ahead of it, and residents surrounded and heartbroken by it.
His reporting laid out ample evidence that climate change is creating a more hospitable environment for beetles, and a more perilous future for alpine forests, whether in the Intermountain West's famous ski areas or the national parks that define the region. The series reported that few of these places will ever again look the same in our lifetime.
The Grantham Prize jury praised Loomis' "methodical research and measured reporting" and noted the series' "potential to help thousands of readers better understand the small and large impacts of climate change with an approach that can be replicated in newsrooms across America."
"Experts have long been aware of the dangers implicit in the wholesale disappearance of ancient forests," Robert Semple Jr. of The New York Times, a Grantham juror, said in a statement. "Brandon Loomis' incredible reporting has now deftly alerted a wider public to this important issue."
Tribune editor Nancy Conway called the series "an important piece of journalism to the community, the region and really, to the nation. We commend Brandon and his team for their extraordinary work and we're pleased by the acknowledgement they've received."
Jeremy and Hannelore Grantham established The Grantham Prize in 2005 to recognize journalists for outstanding reporting on the environment and to improve public understanding of critical environmental issues. The Metcalf Institute at the University of Rhode Island's Graduate School of Oceanography administers the prize.
Special merit winners, each of whom received $5,000, include Paul Greenberg, author of the book Four Fish: The Future of the Last Wild Food; Gary Marcuse and Betsy Carson of Face to Face Media with videographer Shi Lihong for the documentary, "Waking the Green Tiger: A Green Movement Rises in China"; and a group of 12 from the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill for the multimedia series "Coal: A Love Story."
The Economist news magazine won the 2011 prize, while previous years' winners include USA Today and The New York Times. —
Online • "Our Dying Forests"
O The series is available online at sltrib.com/topics/dyingforests