[ad_1]
Fast-growing trees are at risk of dying younger and releasing carbon dioxide, challenging predictions that forests will become “sinks” for global warming emissions, scientists said Tuesday.
The wooden deck absorbs a significant part of the carbon dioxide emitted when burning fossil fuels and plays an important role in predicting its ability to reduce CO2 levels.
The researchers predict that the current climate model predicts that forests will continue to serve as carbon sinks during this century, and high temperatures and CO2 concentrations promote tree growth and help them absorb more carbon as they mature faster.
However, a study led by the University of Leeds in the United Kingdom and published in the journal Nature communicationThey warned that this rapid growth has to do with the death of the trees because they are younger. This suggests that the role of forests increases because carbon storage may be “short-lived”.
The researchers analyzed the records of more than 200,000 tree rings in tree species around the world and found that a trade-off between growth and longevity occurred in almost all trees, including tropical ones.
Society has benefited from the increased ability of forests to absorb carbon in recent decades, said co-author Steve Voelker of the New York State University School of Environmental and Forest Sciences in a statement at the University of Leeds.
However, these CO2 uptake rates are likely to decline as “persistent slow-growing trees grow rapidly but are replaced by vulnerable trees,” he added.
“Like the story of turtles and rabbits, our research shows that faster-growing trees have properties that make them vulnerable, while slow-growing trees have properties that can last.” He said.
The researchers said the findings dramatically increase the chance of dying as the tree reaches its maximum potential size.
However, they said fast-growing trees may invest less in defenses against disease or insect attack, or they may be more susceptible to drought.
The Earth’s average surface temperature has risen more than one degree Celsius above pre-industrial levels, and has risen enough to increase the severity of more devastating droughts, heat waves, and super storms due to rising seas.
Sinking or source?
Regarding the study, David Lee, professor of atmospheric sciences at Manchester University Metropolitan University in the UK, said that the Earth System Climate Model predicts that current forest carbon storage will continue or increase.
“This study, on the contrary, shows that the increase in carbon dioxide damages forests as a carbon sink,” he said.
He added that the idea that “fossil fuel-based emissions can be offset by planting trees (or avoiding deforestation)” doesn’t really fit the scientific research.
But Keith Kirby, a forest ecologist at the University of Oxford, said forests do not need to reverse the role of carbon.
“We cannot rely heavily on higher growth per unit area to maintain and enhance forest carbon sequestration potential, but this could be offset by slowing deforestation and increasing the extent of deforestation so that this can be done sustainably. . . ” He said.
The CO2 that causes global warming is absorbed by global forests, especially tropical regions, which erupt 25-30% of humanity into the atmosphere.
Last year, a high-growth primary tree football stadium was destroyed every 6 seconds, totaling about 38,000 square kilometers (14,500 square miles). World forest monitoring.
© Agence France-Presse
