Planting Trees May Not Help Stop Global Warming

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WORLDWIDE FOREST/BIODIVERSITY CAMPAIGN NEWS

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10/23/99

OVERVIEW & COMMENTARY

We know relatively little about what holds the global ecological

system together. Recent climate change research indicates that

planting trees may be a bad way to address global warming. It may

well be a case of the axiom that "complex problems have simple, easy

to understand, wrong answers." Essentially, the new theory states

that forests planted as a sink for carbon become saturated and return

their carbon to the atmosphere, perhaps accelerating climate changes

at that time. This argues even more strongly for reducing carbon at

its source through reductions in emissions rather than seeking some

magic bullet to save us from the urgency of doing so. "Sinks are

much less secure than carbon and fossil fuels left unburnt, as things

may change unpredictably over time." These findings relate more to

the alleged carbon sequestering benefits of planting trees, and does

_not_ mean carbon currently tied up in natural forests should be

released through continued deforestation--with other land use changes

currently the second largest source of increased atmospheric carbon

dioxide.

g.b.

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Title: Trees lose their appeal as panacea for global warming

Source: Independent (London)

Date: October 21, 1999

Byline: Oliver Tickell

Planting trees may be a bad way of trying to slow global warming,

according to research from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel

on Climate Change.

It says new "carbon sink" forests will quickly become saturated with

carbon and begin to return much of the carbon they contain into the

atmosphere just as global warming accelerates.

The panel's report, highlighted in New Scientist magazine, undermines

a key provision of the Kyoto Protocol, which requires industrialised

countries to cut CO2 emissions. Under it, countries are allowed to

offset emissions by planting trees, at home or in other countries,

and count the carbon so absorbed against their industrial emissions.

The United States in particular has taken this route rather than

seeking more efficient energy and generation use or developing

renewable sources. Confronted with the panel's findings, the US

Environmental Protection Agency has refused to comment on the issue.

But the problem of "sink saturation" will catch up with the agency at

the intergovernmental meeting in Bonn next week, where it will be a

big theme. Some countries, including the US, had hoped to use the

meeting to complete plans for "carbon forests". But with the

credibility of the idea demolished by climate scientists, it looks

improbable that any agreement will be reached.

Britain in particular thinks carbon sink forests should take low

priority. "The main action should be reducing emissions," said a

Department of the Environment spokesman. "Sinks are much less secure

than carbon and fossil fuels left unburnt, as things may change

unpredictably over time."

In its last assessment in 1996 the panel concluded that "carbon

fertilisation", by which elevated CO2 levels stimulate plant growth,

would cause forests to soak up 290 million tonnes of carbon over the

next century, even without new planting. With planting, that could be

raised by another 100 million tonnes. The figures promised a

substantial "carbon sink" into which industrial CO2 emissions, now 6

million tonnes a year, could vanish.

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