This story was originally published by Grist and is shared here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. Slim pine trunks stacked in a mound loomed over my head, curving around me in a partial circle like a dam built by Brontosaurus-sized beavers. I’d followed a long unmarked dirt road earlier this year to see it: One of 48 wood piles in a 12 square-mile section of the Tahoe National Forest outside the town of Truckee in northern California.