It’s hard to understate how politically volatile the high gas and diesel prices are right now. People might uneasily tolerate gasoline at $4, but $6 diesel is a bottom line whack at several key industries.
Case in point, the subject of today’s column (gift link): timber.
A private logger uses hundreds of thousands of gallons of diesel fuel every season, running machines nonstop every day. There’s no way around it, which means that a price spike like this equates a punch you cannot dodge.
This comes at the same time the industry is trying to increase wood markets so that vast tracts of wildfire fuel can be managed effectively, before future wildfires threaten people and property. Technological innovation provides opportunity for novel uses of wood fiber, but it takes investment and time: two things everyone seems to need and no one seems to have.
Read “Facing $6 diesel, Minnesota timber industry needs new markets” in the Wednesday, Sept. 23, 2026 edition of the Minnesota Star Tribune.
Aaron J. Brown is a columnist and member of the editorial board for the Minnesota Star Tribune. His new book about Hibbing Mayor Victor Power and his momentous fight against the world’s largest corporation will be out soon.
