First of all, that lag time is not necessarily that long. It could be as little as five to 10 years, depending on the site and the rate of regrowth of forest. But, yes, if we fail to regenerate adequately, that lag time could be longer. It could be as long as 20 years and in extreme cases, perhaps even 30. That's clearly not desirable.
A lot depends on how we harvest, what we do with the residue that is there and how quickly we replant and encourage reforestation.
The point is that the alternative of not harvesting is not necessarily enhancing forest carbon sinks either. We recently completed a study with Parks Canada looking at our national parks—the forests in 31 national parks. We showed that since 1990 these national park forests were not carbon sinks over the cumulative period, particularly in the west where insects, drought and wildfire caused carbon losses.
Conservation and stopping logging in the world of climate change is not necessarily a solution either. These kinds of analyses are so critically important so that we can develop science-based, credible analyses of the alternatives that are available to us.