Safeguarding forests is a key strategy in the fight against the climate crisis that doesn't receive much attention. Trees are natural mechanisms for carbon-capturing. Unlike other forms of cooling the climate, trees don't cost as much and need less work.
Keeping Trees on the Ground
There is no shortage of tree-planting initiatives, however, conservation and restoration efforts of forest rarely get the same level of support. For example, the US Energy Act of 2020 with a budget of $447 million jump-starting technologically based carbon-capture and storage initiatives lacked provisions for the protection and conservation of existing natural forests.
Researchers that work on climate change and forest carbon cycles suggest that protecting trees and existing natural forests is key in meeting global climate goals.
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Growing Carbon Stockpiles
Natural forests are able to pull roughly ⅓ of all man-made carbon dioxide emissions from the atmosphere annually. Researchers calculate that ending deforestation and allowing existing forests to mature and keep growing at their natural pace will enable forests to remove twice as much carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
A tree's branches, roots, and half of its stems are composed of carbon. Living and dead trees, together with forest soils hold roughly 80% of all carbon currently in the planet's atmosphere.
Trees capture and store carbon over prolonged periods of time. As an example, redwoods and wester cedars in the coastal forests in the Pacific Northwest can live for more than 800 years. When the tree dies and decomposes, much of the carbon stored will be deposited in the soil where it will remain for centuries.
Trees that have matured and reached full root, bark, and canopy development deal with climate change more efficiently than young trees. Mature trees also store hundreds of years' worth of carbon and accumulate more carbon annually.
A review in 2019 by researchers reported that state and federal reporting underestimated wood-product-based carbon dioxide emissions by 25-55%. Analysis of Oregon carbon emissions from wood harvested over the past century shows that 65% of the original carbon stored in the trees was returned to the atmosphere, while landfills retained 16%, and 19% remained in wood products.
Keeping an Eye on Bigger Trees
A study published in the journal Frontiers in Forests and Global Change in November of 2020 shows why strategic forest carbon reserve programs should keep an eye on mature and old forests rather than expelling efforts on tree-planting initiatives.
Bigger trees, with 21-inch (diameter) trunks, make up for 3% of forests but can store 42% of the above-ground CO2. Globally, a 2018 study found largest-diameter trees hold half of all the CO2 stored in the world's forests.
Projections by experts show that the best way to prevent the worst impacts of climate change is for governments to increase pledges in reducing carbon emission by up to 80%. Experts say that the upcoming 10-20 years are critical windows in addressing the climate crisis where trees will prove to be the most efficient and cost-effective way of combating climate change.
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