Is It Getting Warmer?

Union of Concerned Scientists - February 16, 2006

This article does a very good job of describing the role that forests play in the carbon cycle. The article describes the US forests and their role and current standing as carbon sinks. It makes a fairly strong argument of using increased forestation to reduce the threat of fossil fuel burning. The article also points out that in many parts of the world there is an effort in place to reduce forest size so that the land may be used for other purposes.

As globally important storehouses of carbon, forests play a critical role in influencing the Earth’s climate. Forest plants and soils drive the global carbon cycle by sequestering carbon dioxide through photosynthesis and releasing it through respiration. Although carbon uptake by photosynthesis eventually declines as trees age, many mature forests continue to sequester carbon in their soils.

Forest and land-use measures have the potential to reduce net carbon emissions by the equivalent of 10-20% of projected fossil fuel emissions through 2050.

There is a widespread and misguided belief that logging or clearing mature forests and replacing them with fast-growing younger trees will benefit the climate by sequestering atmospheric CO2. While younger trees grow and sequester carbon quickly, the fate of stored carbon when mature forests are logged must also be considered. When a forest is logged, some of its carbon may be stored for years or decades in wood products. But large quantities of CO2 are also released to the atmosphere - immediately through the disturbance of forest soils, and over time through the decomposition of leaves, branches, and other detritus of timber production. One study found that even when storage of carbon in timber products is considered, the conversion of 5 million hectares of mature forest to plantations in the Pacific Northwest over the last 100 years resulted in a net increase of over 1.5 billion tons of carbon to the atmosphere.

Read the article here.

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Filed under: Getting warmer, Weather science

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